childreninglobalperspective

Organizations reflecting students’ personal and professional interests

mhschme — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 21:34:39 +0000

In the next few days, the students will select a professional or non-governmental organization that resonates with their personal or professional goals and has some kind of focus on children. They will research the organization’s web site and introduce that organization to us in their posts. I’m curious to see what they will come up with. These posts should be up by Tuesday, April 24. Stay tuned!

Service Learning insights

mhschme — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 18:41:40 +0000

The students in my course could choose from among three options for service learning.

Option 1 was to learn about “best practices” for children as articulated by various organizations. The students considered how best practices could be organized, found new ones, and thought about what areas of best practices might still be needed.

Option 2: Students worked with each other to create interactive, educational experiences for children at the Children’s Discovery Museum here in Normal, Illinois. The goal was to have them think about what they have been learning, and design related educational activities at a child-level to help local children to think about children from a global perspective. The students presented activities to the children and their parents on Saturday, April 14 from 10am-2pm.

Option 3: Students explored in detail why the United States is one of only two U.N. member countries that has not ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child treaty. They created a presentation about this, which you can see here.

Student learning based on Nicola Ansell’s book, Children, Youth and Development

mhschme — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 18:22:39 +0000

Students shared insights they had gained from reading this 2005 publication. A revised edition is set to come out this November.

Documentaries about children

mhschme — Wed, 14 Mar 2012 19:37:00 +0000

The next assigned post for the students (due March 20) will be their response to one of several documentary films about children around the world. The students will link the issues in their selected documentaries to our course theme of power and inequality.

Here are the documentary options the students got to choose from, linked to web sites where there is more information about these films:

Reflection about our field trip to see Albany Park Theater Project’s performance of Home/Land

mhschme — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 22:58:34 +0000

This week, the students have posted their thoughts about the play, Home/Land, that we watched in Chicago at the Albany Park Theater Project’s Laura Wiley Theater on Feb. 11, 2012. The students have connected themes from the play to our course goals, which are:

Transformational Goal: to enhance students’ global and sociological understanding of children’s experiences, and their knowledge about how to get involved in promoting the vitality of children in our interconnected world.

Outcome related to Voice and Action: Students will increase their ability to speak articulately about children’s issues, and learn how to get involved with organizations in order to benefit children.

Outcome related to Power and Inequality: Students will develop their understanding of how dimensions of power and inequality shape children’s opportunities and lead to advantages or disadvantages across the life course.

Outcome related to a Global Perspective: Students will expand their abilities to think about children’s experiences at a global level scale.

Outcome related to Diversity and Trends: Students will expand their abilities to discuss diversity and trends in children’s experiences globally.

Enjoy the posts!

Children’s Media

mhschme — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 19:25:50 +0000

This week, the students will view and listen to various children’s radio and video projects. They will choose among the following options.

UNICEF TV and Radio

Children in Communication about Migration project

Innocenti Research Center

Save the Children (can get to specific country sites from here)

Youth Radio/ Youth Media International

Children’s Radio Foundation

Plan International: Youth, Media and Development

Global organizations focused on children

mhschme — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 19:06:41 +0000

This week the students are reading on-line reports put out by global non-governmental and intergovernmental organizations that focus on children’s issues.

Here are the organizations they could choose from.

UNICEF, Publications Page

Innocenti Research Center

UNESCO, Programme for the Education of Children

UNESCO, Social and Human Sciences, focus on Youth

UNESCO, Youth Forum 2011

World Health Organization, section on Child Maltreatment

World Health Organization, section on Child Health

Save the Children International

Child Rights International Network

Human Rights Watch, section on Children’s Rights

International Labour Organization, section on Child Labor

Plan International

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, and UNICEF

mhschme — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 15:36:15 +0000

This week, the students are learning about the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, its oversight group called the Committee on the Rights of the Child, an annual global prize called the World’s Children’s Prize for the Rights of the Child, and a bit more about UNICEF, the United Nations agency focused on children. The students will respond to the global agendas for children they are learning about, drawing upon web sites for the groups mentioned above. Their blog posts about these will appear on Feb. 14. Here are some links if you would like to look at what the students are reading!

http://www.unicef.org/crc/

http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/crc/

http://worldschildrensprize.org/

http://www.unicef.org/

http://www.unicef.org/videoaudio/video_top_cartoons.html

http://www.unicef.org/photography/index.php

Field trip to Albany Park Theater Project on 2/11/12

mhschme — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 15:24:49 +0000

Thanks to the class for taking part in our field trip to Chicago, to see the Albany Park Theater Project youth ensemble perform the show they helped to create, Home/Land. I found the performance to be very moving and inspiring, and it made visible many of the human struggles that come with immigration to the United States. The students will make connections between our course and Home/Land in their blogs on March 6, so stay tuned! In the meantime, here’s a photo we took on the set with members of the ensemble after the show.

Global Trends related to Children and Youth

mhschme — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 04:39:54 +0000

There are 30 students in the Children in Global Perspective class, and soon all their blogs will be linked to my site here. The first blog assignment will launch from the readings the students are doing this week, which focus on global trends related to children and youth. Students will situate themselves within the world trends the authors are writing about. I’ve asked them to post approximately three paragraphs and demonstrate a strong understanding of the assigned material. To read student posts, just click on the names on the right. The first blog post should be completed by Tuesday, January 31 at 2pm central time.