iEARN in Action, May 24, 2005

UPDATES ON TSUNAMI RELIEF!

Benjamin Franklin International School in Barcelona raised 1700 euros for the relief of tsunami victims in Khao Lak, Thailand. Funds were raised by selling memorial flowers and pledging a high school 5 kilometer walk. In June the middle school will stage a 5K walk to continue the funding drive.

iEARN PARTICIPATION SURVEY - SHARE YOUR FEEDBACK! Have you been involved in iEARN projects? "This is an invitation and request to take part in an iEARN-wide survey. It is a survey of how iEARN serves our needs and how all of us together can further develop the ways in which we work together, how we structure our work and how we go about the essential work of iEARN: enabling youth across the globe to collaborate in making a meaningful difference to the health and welfare of the planet. Please visit the survey site at http://www.iearn.org/survey by July 5th. The results of your opinions and information will be collated, analyzed and developed into a report available for use by all iEARN participants. In addition, it will be shared with the Assembly in its meeting in Dakar, Senegal, July 16-17, 2005 to help shape program improvements in 2005-2006.

Join Us! iEARN Projects, Seeking Contacts, Contributions and Collaborators

**DOWNLOAD THE NEW iEARN 2004-2005 PROJECT BOOK! 
http://www.iearn.org/projects/projectbook.html (available in Arabic, English, French, Russian, Slovenian, Spanish, and Uzbek), or for a full listing of iEARN projects, see: http://www.iearn.org/projects/

REMINDER! PLEASE REFERENCE MONTHS RATHER THAN SEASONS WHEN DESCRIBING PROJECT TIMELINES. A project that "starts in the fall" could mean different months depending on where in the world participants live. Please remember to reference months rather than seasons when posting information about project and activity time-lines.

GOOD DEEDS PROJECT. iEARN Youth from the Zhran School in Alexandra, Egypt joined together to participate in iEARN's Good Deed Project. Not only did students become active community members, but also used iEARN online discussions to share personal reflections and were so motivated they created and launched their own website dedicated to Good Deeds, see it here. Visit BRIDGE Project Highlights for more on the Zhran Schools' new website.

IT'S WORTH READING PROJECT WELCOMES NEW CO-FACILITATOR. Debbie Pellegrino of the USA joins Sobia Alam and Afshan Haneef Khan in facilitating students to write book reviews and reports of the books they have read and would like to recommend to others. See http://www.iearn.org/projects/worthreading.html.

NEWS FROM THE MY HERO PROJECT. http://myhero.com/newsletter2005 The deadline for submitting short films to the MY HERO FILM FESTIVAL has been extended for iEARN members to August 1, 2005 for more information and resources visit: http://myhero.com/filmfestival. Wendy Milette Director of the MY HERO FILM FESTIVAL and Victoria Murphy Curator of the MY HERO Gallery invite teachers and students to bring their hero movies and art works to Senegal and to join in MY HERO multi-media workshops at this years iEARN conference. Submit stories, art and films to this interactive online journal celebrating the best of humanity to: http://myhero.com, http://myhero.com/gallery, http://myhero.com/create, http://miheroe.org

JOIN STUDENTS AND TEACHERS IN SUDAN IN PROJECT WORK. Mona Hamed writes that high secondary schools start in Sudan, Africa on June 18. They look forward to establishing partnerships with classrooms worldwide.

INVITATION FROM ARGENTINA TO JOIN FOLKLORE PROJECT. In particular, the group is exploring the history and culture of musical instruments. Contact Maria Lina.

INVITATION TO JOIN "LIVE THE EARTH" PROJECT. "My name is Jalu Noor Cahyanto, a teacher of Madania School in Indonesia. I teach elementary class, grade 3. Our topic is all about Earth. Students are learning to know about their earth, from very basic. They look forward to getting responses from their international friends, particularly in primary levels."

GREAT APES PROJECT. A group of students in Australia have been working on/coordinating the project for a number of years and welcome participation of teachers and students worldwide. Contact Rob King or see http://www.iearn.org.au/greatapes.

Check it out! Resources, Contests, Web Sites and Announcements (This includes resources that are not part of iEARN)

REGISTER FOR iEARN TEACHER PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT ONLINE COURSES NOW. The Fall 2005 sessions of the iEARN online courses will start in September 12, 2005. By taking any of the 8 online courses at iEARN, you will learn how to integrate collaborative project-based learning into your curriculum and fulfill your curriculum standards using technology. You will learn how to connect your classrooms with their peers around the world. This is a great chance to become an active member of the global learning community. The online courses are approved by Departments of Education in New York City, and the States of Delaware, Washington and Rhode Island and Wyoming in the USA for teacher professional credentials. So, earn your professional development credits in a most effective, extremely exciting learning experience! Register for a course before it is filled up! http://www.iearn.org/professional/. Questions?? Ask us: Otgo and Losira at onlinepd@us.iearn.org.

iEARN PAKISTAN CENTRE HAS MOVED TO NEW PREMISES LOCATED AT: 22, Ali Bhai Centre, 233-A, Shahra-e-Qaideen, P.E.C.H.S., Block-2, Karachi - 75400, Pakistan. Telephone: (92) -021-4547547. All iEARNers globally are requested to update their address book and direct all future correspondence to the address above. For more information about iEARN-Pakistan, see http://www.iearnpk.org/.

SUBMIT POEMS FOR POETRY ANTHOLOGY. Anne Mearns of South Africa writes, "I would like youth from all ages to send to me poems of nature, trees, water. rains, soil, animals, birds. fish, oceans, etc. Any saying about nature will also be welcome. e.g No rain, no mushroom, No God, no world. I would like to put together an anthology of poems and saying. It will be a book that will be called Nature through the eyes of the children of the world. All poems must be in English.

WIN A 1,000 USD AWARD FROM THE GLOBAL YOUTH ACTION NETWORK. If you've started a project that addresses a need in your community, you could win a 1,000 USD Global Youth In Action Award! Click here and here. With a grant from the Shei'rah Foundation, this year's awards program particularly seek to recognize youth-initiated projects that take a new approach to problem-solving. In addition, we will help publicize your project as we help to create greater media recognition for the positive things young people are doing. Have questions? Please contact the Global Youth Action Network at gyan@youthlink.org with any questions about the YIAA!

MILENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS (MDG) ART CONTEST "VISION 2015": YOUR FUTURE." Presented by the Global Gallery, in partnership with Arts For Global Development Inc. (Art4Development.net) and the Millennium Campaign. How do you interpret development issues? How can we overcome the challenges of underdevelopment? What is your vision for the world in 2015? Contest open from April 01 - May 30, 2005. Submissions will be voted on by TakingITGlobal members. A winner will receive a TakingITGlobal prize pack. You must be a TakingITGlobal member, under the age of 30, to participate. http://www.takingitglobal.org/express/gallery/contests/.

Coming Soon! Upcoming Events and Projects!

MEARN (MOROCCO EDUCATION AND RESOURCE NETWORK, iEARN-Morocco) WORKSHOP, MAY 28-29,2005. Nour_eddine Laouni "One of Mearn strategic goals within the Moroccan educational enterprise is raising awareness of the potential uses of ICTs in education. We are so pleased to announce our participation in MATE Regional Branch workshop/training on ICTs in Beni Mellal, Morocco. Implementing ICTs in Building Pedagogical Projects is the title of this interesting session. We would like you please to post your warm welcome to all participants." Send greetings to the Teachers Forum Discussion Thread .

2ND bEARN (BANGLADESH EDUCATION AND RESOURCE NETWORK) NATIONAL ORIENTATION. May 30, 2005 at Presidency University, Conference Hall.

ONLY 10 DAYS LEFT TO SUBMIT TO CELDA 2005 CONFERENCE. Deadline for submissions: 3 June 2005 (for all contributions) -- IADIS International Conference on Cognition and Exploratory Learning in Digital Age (CELDA 2005). December 14-16, 2005 - Porto, Portugal. See http://www.iadis.org/celda2005/.

JOIN IN ONLINE COMPONENT OF NECC (NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL COMPUTING CONFERENCE) IN PHILADELPHIA, USA, JUNE 27-30. http://center.uoregon.edu/ISTE/NECC2005/. iEARN-USA is hosting 13 sessions, as well as the NECC International Reception on June 27 from 4:00 5:30 pm. A US Cadre of Facilitators is coordinating the sessions, with plans for video-conferencing from NH, WA, the American Museum of Natural History in NYC, Botswana, Egypt, Japan, Lebanon, Pakistan and Taiwan.

THIRD ANNUAL BRIDGE REGIONAL CONFERENCE, BEIRUT, LEBANON, JULY 8-13, 2005. iEARN-Lebanon (http://www.iearnlb.org/) will be hosting the Third Annual BRIDGE Regional Conference in Beirut. The conference will include educators from iEARN programs in Bangladesh, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Jordan, Lebanon, Malaysia, Morocco, Nepal, Oman, Pakistan, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, and the United States The focus will be on professional development and curriculum building, affording participants the opportunity to exchange educational tools and resources. Train-the-Trainer seminars, project planning workshops, and community service learning projects will be among the topics of discussion.

12TH ANNUAL iEARN CONFERENCE - JULY 17-24 2005 IN DAKAR, SENEGAL. The conference will be held at the Ngor Djarama Hotel. Want to present a workshop proposal at the conference? send an e-mail message to: workshopregistration@us.iearn.org and a workshop application will be sent to you automatically. Want to register to participate in the conference? Send a message to: confregistration@us.iearn.org. Watch http://www.iearn.org for more information, or login to the 2005 Senegal Conference Discussion Forum. Youth are encouraged to join in the new 2005 Youth Summit Forum to help organizers in planning the youth summit.

The Senegal Minister of Education, His Excellency Moustapha Sourang, welcomes us to Dakar and writes: "I have received your letter regarding the conference you will organize in Dakar.  Enthusiastically, I want to thank you for your support of iEARN-Senegal. I am most grateful for this."

- From the iPEACE team: Take part in a the iPEACE Painting Exhibition held in the 12TH Annual iEARN Conference in Senegal, and contribute to promoting world peace, and friendship. All youth, students and teachers can take part. We've received paintings, poems, and articles from Iran, Russia, Pakistan, Morocco, USA, and are still looking for your artistic pieces. The deadlines have been extended up to June 15th. Should you have problems with posting the artistic peaces, or have any other questions feel free to contact Mostafa Nejati. To find everything about this Exhibition and how to take part see here.

- From Samaneh Sadeghi in Iran - "As a suggestion for iEARN Conferences we suggest to have an International but National Song, which is written by all students all over the world and will be sung by iEARN Conference Participants(in every year not just this one in Senegal). So, 1 or 2 students would be chosen from each country as its agents for writing the poem. As we don't have much time to Senegal Conference please send their Names as soon as possible! The students should have a good talent in writing the poem and be fluent in English. Please, choose them & Send their names & E-Mail addresses.

WORLD YOUTH DEVELOPMENT AND ICT CONFERENCE 2005, ARUSHA, TANZANIA, AUGUST 11-12, 2005. Theme " Young People Creating Global Culture." The conference will bring more than 250 young professionals, community leaders, NGO leaders, University students, ICT professionals, and all lovers of youths. For more information, contact Titus Tossy Organizing Chairman. Website: http://www.onevillagefoundation.org

Recent Events!

iEARN-PAKISTAN ORGANISED TWO DAY SUMMER CAMP IN KARACHI, MAY 7-9, AND PESHAWAR, MAY 18-19, 2005. Altogether 30 students and 3 teachers from 20 iEARN-BRIDGE schools participated in the two summer camps. The workshop covered two strands -- introduction to 'iEARN online project based learning' and 'youth volunteering and community service.' Youth developed timelines for participating in different iEARN projects. Also they developed 32 different short term service learning activities to implement during the summer vacations. Find their action plans here.

GREETINGS TO NEW PALESTINIAN TEACHER PARTICIPANTS IN MAY 21-22 WORKSHOP! On May 23, Kahraman Arafa, iEARN Palestine Coordinator writes, "Dear all friends in iEARN, Teachers and students have been working on their first project which all the trained schools will work on with you. It is a very interesting one as its title seems to be so silly or impossible but really it has a great meaning inside. Its title is (Give us wings to fly) and later on we will send all the details according to the project template. Very briefly, it is about how you could enjoy life despite all the difficulties and challenges. You will hear from them so we are waiting your comments and reply." Meet the new teachers in the Teachers Forum.

FIRST ENVIRONMENTAL DAY IN JORDAN, MAY 21, 2005. iEARN-Jordan Coordinator, Mohammad Jarrah, shares that, under the auspices of His Excellency Dr. Khalid Al Irani, Minister of Environment, iEARN Jordan had its first Environmental Day as a first step towards having YouthCaN next year. 14 public and private schools participated in the event at the Asriyya School, which included lectures, workshops and presentations, a painting competition, and community service project in which students visited an orphanage and children's center.

FIRST NATIONAL iEARN WORKSHOP IN BENIN IN MAY. See pictures, posted by iEARN Representative, Hyacinthe Tossou here.

iEARN-SENEGAL WORKSHOP, MAY 10, 2005. Ndeye MArie Gueye Fall from Senegal announced that a group of English teachers were trained at College Sacre Coeur.

iEARN-GEORGIA WORKSHOP, MAY 12, 2005. Pavle Tvaliashvili of iEARN-Georgia announced that a "very enthusiastic group of Georgian educators in a very nice part of the country will participate in the iEARN workshop and join our big family."