Participate and share: Poster 
After one year of officially returning back to life as it was before the pandemic, it is only fair to start discussing the positive outcomes and the meaningful experiences stay-at-home measures and distance learning brought into the lives of so many, specially elementary students. In almost every country and in the last couple of years opportunities to spend time with loved ones, friends and family, were seriously reduced or nonexistent. However, despite the challenges, lockdown and distance learning provided us with a variety of opportunities to develop our creativity and to enhance innovation in every way.
On the one hand, people had to think about new ways to keep social relations going. Even from apart, families strived to be together for important occasions, birthdays were celebrated through Zoom sessions, surprises and gifts were delivered to the doors of hundreds and new methods for keeping in touch with loved ones became a priority. Thus, the use of digital media for social connection increased significantly as it was the only way to check on our families, co-workers and friends. On the other hand, learners around the globe became more skillful on managing digital tools in formal and informal education. Children, specifically, became familiar and used to hold online sessions while playing with their peers and not only online games but witnessing through the camera how toys will move around a friends’ bedroom creating scenarios for holding virtual play dates. New ways for keeping up with friends became a reality. Children, being part of this phenomenon, joined online sessions for their peers’ of family’s celebrations, with the same familiarity they joined classes everyday through digital platforms.
It is time to see the previous as the basis over which a new era for digital innovation and communication was built. Children became the lead on demonstrating that digital communities for learning, entertaining and in general, for keeping social interaction, were feasible. They might be the pioneers for the birth of global communities created for kids and by kids.
At Highlands International School we strive to empower our students to thrive in a digital world, our students not only acquire abilities to handle applications, platforms and tools for creativity and distance learning; but also to be aware of the soft skills required to be responsible digital citizens and for using technology for the better. This is why already with the pandemic and social distancing being reduced to the minimum faculty and students keep up with the inertia of finding new ways to communicate with people from abroad and establish learning communities that are scenarios in which students can share, learn and promote meaningful collaboration. During lockdown HighNetworking was born in our school to collaborate with foreign communities and schools in the USA, Rome, Spain and Chile to make learning meaningful and social interaction possible. Based on these experiences, fifth graders participated in a project with a school in California to bond with kids their own age on the basis of a common topic: sports.
Given the fact that once the crisis was handled the first worldwide events that were held were related to sports (i.e. The Olympics), students drew the conclusion that despite the circumstances Sports are a universal language that bring diverse nationalities together. Therefore, when they found out that for 10 and 11 year olds football was a common passion, they came up with the idea of sharing strategies, plays and experiences to nurture their own sports practice with views from different perspectives. This is how the digital tool we’ll present at ISTE was born. After making the most of the social and digital skills learnt during lockdown and distance learning students held one to one interviews with kids from the USA discovering a common passion: American Football and Football Soccer. Thus, they built a community in which through digital collaboration and using AR they exchanged strategies, moves and ideas on how to become better football players
Hence, we invite you to join this session and discover the positive impact the COVID-19 crisis had on kids whose elementary education became a worldwide milestone. See how they used the social and digital skills developed during the last two years to collaborate with kids their own age sharing what is most important for them and demonstrating there are great ways to bond within world societies as we strive for a more peaceful future.
The main objectives for our project are:
- To share with the audience the development of a digital project that transformed the challenges of the pandemic and turned them into a background for meaningful collaboration.
- To prove how how SEL skills, technology and innovation can work together to launch a joint product among children from diverse nationalities.
- To share students’ creativity when using digital knowledge for the better.
- To demonstrate there are different ways to use technology on a 1:1 instructional program to develop students SEL and digital skills.
Students will show evidences of the learning process that led them to establish friendships with American students and to the creation of their digital game. Using digital tools they will share pieces of information gathered from one to one interviews with peers from the USA. Student presentes will also explain the audience how they developed their digital game using the information they gathered as they collaborated with other students who share their passion towards sports. Finally, students will show the audience how AR games work and how they shared moves, plays and ideas that made sports practice more meaningful for both groups of students.
Audience will have the opportunity to listen to each student talk for about 5-10 minutes and will have the chance to watch in AR the outcomes of the digital exchange students had, as well as listen or watch the reflection of this experience from both group of students. Presenters will invite the audience to make questions and will be willing to answer or share any information visitors ask about the project.
* Culatta, Richard E. (2021). Digital for GOOD Raising Kids to Thrive in an Online World. Harvard Business Review Press,.
* Robinson, K., & Aronica, L. (2016). Creative schools: Revolutionizing education from the ground up.
* PhD, R. K., & Robinson, K. (2022, March 1). Imagine If . . .: Creating a Future for Us All. Penguin Books.
* Spencer, J., & Juliani, A. J. (2017). Empower: What happens when students own their learning.
* Wagner, T. (2015). Creating Innovators: The Making of Young People Who Will Change the World (Reprint ed.) PhD, R. K., & Robinson, K. (2022, March 1). Imagine If . . .: Creating a Future for Us All. Penguin Books.
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