doha • Qatar Academy is participating in the Horizon Project 2008, a global project based upon the Horizon Report created by the New Media Consortium and Educause.
Ten schools located in six countries around the world will write a collaborative report using a wiki and communicate via an educational "social" network created just for this project. Envisioning the future of education and society is the focus of
the project.
This project will link over 200 high school students and their teachers, and include expert advisers, peer review classrooms, and expert judges from around the world. DonTapscott, author of the highly acclaimed book, Wikinomics, delivered the keynote address to these classes via his YouTube channel.
The said project is part of the emerging trend in internationally-aware schools to embrace a holistic and constructivist educational approach and work collaboratively with others around the world in order to create students who are competitive and global-minded.
In the words of Dr Liberto, Head of Technology at Qatar Academy, "The Horizon Project thrusts students out of their classrooms and home countries into an international technological learning community."
The Grade 10 and 11 students at Qatar Academy involved in the project are also challenged to create a personal piece of multimedia that exposes their topic and area of impact, while outsourcing a part of this to a student in a classroom not in Qatar.
"We are excited about this year's project and the global awareness and technology skills it imparts to our students," said project co-founders Julie Lindsay, Head of Information Technology at Qatar Academy in Doha, and Vicki Davis, teacher at Westwood Schools in Camilla, Georgia. "We are truly amazed at the impact that students have on the world and one another when they are linked with effective, meaningful projects with high academic standards and today's leading collaborative technologies like wikis, blogs, and educational networks."
As a sister to the award winning Flat Classroom Project, featured in Thomas Friedman's book "The World is Flat" (http://flatclassroomproject.wikispaces.com) the Horizon Project also lowers or 'flattens' the classrooms walls by emphasizing connection, communication and collaboration as well as higher-order thinking skills and problem solving.
