Comparing Communities… E-mailing with Keypals!

The world can seem a very big and puzzling place to a Grade 2 student. But it is smaller and less mysterious if you are one of Betty MacLure's students at Wainwright Elementary School in Wainwright, Alberta. You have taken part in her People Around the World tele-collaborative project and have learned about life in another country.

"It's a virtual visit to another country," explains MacLure. Through email correspondence with other classes, students learn about life in another country and compare it with their own experience.

The project was inspired when a teacher from Wainwright Elementary School went on an exchange to Australia, and an Australian teacher came to Wainwright. MacLure saw it as an excellent opportunity for her students to learn about another country through the eyes of someone visiting for the first time and those of a lifelong resident.

Soon email messages were travelling back and forth as students described their school and community and asked questions about what their counterparts were studying. The students took pictures of their school activities, and then MacLure posted them on web pages for the Australian students to view.

Just one of the activities in the project was the exchange of PowerPoint presentations about the Christmas holidays. The Canadian students were amazed to see pictures of people picnicking on warm, sunny beaches, while the Australian children were amazed to see pictures of skiers atop snowy mountains. "It highlighted the difference between the northern and southern hemispheres in a way that a class lesson never could!" says MacLure.