One of the simplest things to do towards internationalisation of the curriculum is to include a variety of international examples, ideas and perspectives into your curriculum thereby giving students the opportunity to experience their learning through diverse ideas and ways of doing things. Unfortunately, many educational programs in higher education tend to stick to very monolithic ways of doing things, with little to no global perspectives and examples embedded in them. There are arguments that suggests that students need to experience their learning within their discipline in a particular way, often influenced by historical practices that does not reflect the contemporary societies and expectations we live in today. Most students often experience their education from a single perspective, in Australia often through the perspectives of the dominant cultures and ideas. Most higher education student populations reflect the increasing diversity that exist within communities, however many of the teaching and learning approaches do not reflect this diversity. Most students from the various diverse backgrounds like students from refugee backgrounds, indigenous students, students from various culturally and linguistically diverse communities, including international students often do not get to engage in ideas, perspectives, and ways of knowing that they can relate to. Many of these students adapt because they just have to. Meaningful internationalisation of curriculum should encourage the use and application of diverse ideas, knowledges and examples. It should give students the opportunity to engage with global challenges through different ways of doing things. Contemporary internationalisation should aim to develop students as global citizens.
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International education has always been treated with significant importance by Australian and other education exporting countries’ universities, and governments. One of the things that COVID-19 has highlighted though is that most governments and institutions have emphasised the economic benefits of international education over anything else. While there is nothing inherently wrong with privatised international education as it provides opportunities for many students from around the world to access high quality education, and develop global perspectives along the way, however it would be very short sighted if we use international education only to fill the gap in funding shortfalls and improve financial positions of universities. International education allows educators to tap into the vast wealth of diverse perspectives that having international student in classrooms provides. Appreciating diversity allows us to recognise the way different ideas and challenges are approached by different people. Engaging in diverse perspectives allows us to recognise our own ideologies positioned within an ocean of differences. These concepts do not only apply to disciplines such as social sciences and humanities, but equally relevant in the sciences and engineering. Having appreciation of different ideologies allows us to tackle challenges in a much more balanced way. Many international students often speak a language other than English, often with noticeable accents, and the way they approach studies are often very different due to their own previous study experiences and expectations. Most international students approach higher education studies with very different set of motivations, likely influenced by family and community expectations. This type of profile sets them as ‘different’ from the mainstream domestic students and frequently treated as if lacking in skills and attitudes for higher education studies. The educational outcomes and research outputs of many of these students tells a different story! International education should focus of embedding diverse perspectives within the curriculum and enabling all students to experience different ideologies and ways of approaching problems. Recognising that every student is different and will bring their own ways of doing things into the classroom mix is important. Even if we have students and graduates who prefer to hold on to specific ideologies, as long as their position is an informed one through experiencing differences. It is very possible to bring diversity into the classroom without having international students, however having students from different parts of the world makes it that much more interesting. A curriculum that enables diverse perspectives makes for an inclusive classroom for all students. Internationalisation of the learning experience should not be treated as a passing fad. We have in various previous blogs discussed the relevance of internationalisation to develop relevant 21st century skills, and prepare our students for ‘future work’. Although there is some variation in what skills actually constitutes 21st century skills, there is widespread agreement from many sources, including the OECD that critical thinking, global citizenship, communication and collaboration, inter-cultural competency, social and ethical responsibilities, flexibility, foreign languages, diversity of ideas, etc. are some of the essential 21st century skills that students need to develop to be future ready.
Internationalisation of the learning experience, when done effectively, can be used to develop many of these skills. Higher education is not immune to the ever increasing border-less world of education and business. Australian higher education institutions are experiencing record numbers of international students and this trend is unlikely to slow down anytime soon. This provides Australian higher education institutions fantastic opportunities to embed the development of some these 21st century skills on our curriculum. We might differ in our understanding about what exactly is intercultural competency, and how to go about developing it, but one thing we can agree on is that when students from different backgrounds are given opportunities to interact, in meaningful ways, with each other, they are more likely to develop appreciation of diverse ideas and thinking. This idea can be taken even further in more structured and deliberate ways to develop higher order internationalisation skills. Popular discourse around international education in Australia, and many other education exporting countries, is on the financial incentives for higher education institutions to attract international students, and with public funding for higher education declining, many institutions focus significant resources on their international student recruitment. One of the things that is often overlooked in many of these discourses is that international students have agency. They are also making deliberate decisions about developing their own future ready skills, including what to study and where to study to give them the best chance for the future of work. International students are also, just as we are, making deliberate decisions about developing their own intercultural competencies, among the other 21st century skills. What better way to understand another culture than to immerse yourself on it. Many international therefore may already have an upper hand, and with many already speaking a language other than English, some might argue that international students are much better positioned for the future of work. Higher education needs to move beyond the financial focus on international students, and start to treat international students from a strength based position, with agency and forethought about their future. International students provides higher education institutions with amazing opportunity to internationalise the learning experience in meaningful ways for all out students. Group-work and collaborative learning activities are becoming a common part of most higher education classrooms. Group-work activities helps develop important collaborative, communication, negotiation and many other skills that are now starting to be recognised as essential for global workplaces and skills that future ready workforce should have. Unfortunately, some group-work activities are purely a reaction to the increasing numbers of students, rather than aiming to develop these skills. It’s no surprise than that most people involved in group-work activities don’t like it: educators find it hard to manage groups and students would rather do their own work than having to work with non-conforming students. In many cases international student tend to be at the receiving end of many of the criticisms around group-work: “the international students don’t do any work”, “the international students have bad English, so I have to do all the work”, “I am happy to do all the work myself” … etc. etc. In my own experience, the international students often are eager to engage in group-work, particularly with domestic students as it gives them an opportunity to “make friends” and “improve their English”. This is not surprising given the vast majority of International students we get in Australia are from collectivist cultural backgrounds. So what can we do to maximise the benefits of group-work activities? It is important to design group-work activities properly: As mentioned earlier on, many educators use group-work activities purely to address workload issues. This, I believe, will lead to problems. Group-work activities need to reflect the skills that you want your students do. In many cases this should also include reviewing the learning outcomes to see where the group-work activities fit. This will also help align the group-work activities to group-work assessments. One of the most important aspect of group-work activities is that it must be complex enough to require a number of people to solve it: ‘if a group-work activity can be done by one person, than it will be done by one person’. Train students to work in groups: We often expect students to engage in group-work activities, without giving them appropriate training. If you are going to use group-work in your class, it is important to develop that right from the beginning. I have had students from many different countries in my classes, one of the first things I do is get them to get in groups with student from their own countries or speak the same language. Give them a simple problem which they discuss and share among themselves, and then with you. In subsequent classes you can make the problems more complex and move students around out of their original groups. Activities can also involve developing group-work project plans, and understanding what it means, developing responsible expectations for group-work activities. Design teams based on strengths: All students have something to offer. If you have been working with students on various group-work activities over a period of time, you should have a general idea about their strengths and weaknesses. Work with that. Try to form groups with different strengths and diverse skill set. Assess the process of working in groups: often we focus too much on the final outcome of a group activity, like the final report, presentation, etc. In order for group-work activities to work well, you need to demonstrate that students work like how they communicate, negotiate, problem solving, keeping on task, call out when someone is not on task, etc. should be rewarded in terms of marks. You need to give time in-class to monitor this work, provide feedback, and set expectations….make sure your group-work succeeds. You will be able to look at examples of some of these in some of the publications I have done previously: https://eprints.qut.edu.au/128328/1/AnandP-IADIS%202010.pdf https://eprints.qut.edu.au/128314/2/128314.pdf https://eprints.qut.edu.au/128327/1/LanceleyAnand-ISANA%202011.pdf https://eprints.qut.edu.au/128326/1/Anand_ICERI2012.pdf We have been thinking about internationalising the learning experience for a while. Most teachers tend to depend on the existence of international students in their classes to engage in any form of internationalisation experiences, personally I rejoice when I see students from as many diverse backgrounds in my class, however, most teachers don’t do internationalisation very well, and I would argue that most do it extremely poorly.
To internationalise the learning experience, a classroom does not necessarily need international students in them. To start to really engage in internationalisation initiatives, teachers need to change their own thinking, as teachers and academics, we need to re-think what we do? Why we do what we do? And more importantly how do we assess what we get our students to do in our classes? Most higher education educators tend to be over protective over what we do? A good example here is students’ inability to mix and match subjects from different institutions. Just putting internationalisation aside for a while, in order for higher education to remain relevant it needs to re-think everything we have done previously. For example, some of the disruptive trends like micro-credentials, badges, online, just in time qualifications, etc. will require higher education institutions re-think their approaches. In most cases these disruptive trends will require institutions to open up and engage with external entities. Now if we are serious about internationalising the learning experiences, we need to look at it in a similar way as many of the other disruptive trends, many of the future ready skills are indeed developed through internationalisation. We want students to interrogate concepts and ideas that are embedded in different cultural contexts, negotiate differences in values, language and expectations and develop solutions that are respectable and inclusive. These are high level skills that should be embedded in all curriculum that needs to remain relevant for the disruptions that higher education institutions are facing. Naturally understanding the importance of these skills, and how to develop and assess them is the hardest part. Think about group work, most academics use them but very few assess it effectively, and therefore the focus is lost on the important skills that is develop through that process. By opening up our courses we can identify problems that are located in different cultural contexts, perhaps in different geographical locations. Students can be required to identify and define those problems and develop solutions that is culturally sensitive to the location of the problem. Some of these approaches will require to lose some of the control that we tend to have on our courses. These processes develop important internationalisation skills, and therefore assessments regimes should focus more on the processes than the outcomes. It is extremely important to re-focus on exactly what we want to do when we internationalise the curriculum and be prepared to change our own thinking before we can try to change our students’ thinking. There has been a lot of interest in international education recently, and perhaps consequently, somewhat in internationalising of the curriculum. As I have mentioned in previous blogs, internationalising the curriculum is no longer an option, in order to appropriately prepare students for the future of work, it is imperative that the learning experiences that we design for our students includes significant opportunities to engage in globalised ideas, challenges and solutions.
For any teaching and learning initiatives to be effective, students need to engage in learning activities that help them transform their thinking, and ultimately their actions. This is the reason I like to focus on learning experiences, as everything comes down to what students’ experience, through learning activities including assessments. (In fact some of the most effective learning experiences are those that are embedded within assessments, but that is a topic for another time/blog!) So how do we internationalise the learning experience, and ensure that these experiences are transformative? Most educators embed international case studies, examples from different countries, etc. in their classes, which is great, however, in my own experience these approaches probably does not have the type of transformative results that we should be aiming for. Don’t get me wrong, these initiatives are absolutely welcome, but we should really be looking to do more. To be truly transformative these ideas should challenge students’ traditional thinking and doing things. Many teachers use group work in their classes, and if they have international students, create groups that mix international and domestic students in their groups, why? Well if you talk to many teachers they would not hesitate to suggest that the international students need help with their English so the domestic students help them out, perhaps this is true. How about rewarding the process of the group work rather than the actual output.( Rewarding effort, not the output!) That way a really great learning opportunity for the whole class could be to understand how different groups worked, regardless of the makeup of the group, and in some cases actually have groups that are not formed along nationality lines, but their strengths (https://www.16personalities.com/) . Some groups can have all international students. The process of getting students into groups can become a learning activity on its own. Get students to demonstrate and defend the process they used so that others can understand different ways of working. Remember that different people, from different cultures engage in group work very differently! If you are looking for some ideas about some of these transformative ideas, have a look at one of the papers that Byron Lui and I wrote (https://eprints.qut.edu.au/128314/) . Having international students in your classes provides educators with amazing opportunities to engage and explore so many diverse ideas and approaches. However, most would agree that it can be challenging to effectively engage students from diverse backgrounds, with sometimes very different educational experiences and expectations in Australian classrooms. For this blog I would like to share a vignette that used as part of an earlier research looking at engaging students from Asian backgrounds. I have changed some aspects of the vignette to make it more appropriate for this public blog, but the full paper is available at https://eprints.qut.edu.au/128326/
I have been teaching information technology related subjects for a very long time. Most of my classes consist of domestic and international students…in almost all semesters I have noticed similar problems where most of the international students do not engage actively in class discussions…. I have noticed, almost in every session, that the international students generally are not as forthcoming with discussion questions and answers as the domestic students. This is particularly the case when there are domestic students in the same class as well as the international students. In one occasion, I had divided the class into small groups of three students each made up of randomly selected students, where two groups had one domestic student each and three groups had all international students, that is, there were no domestic students in these three groups. I gave different questions to each of the groups and they were required to discuss the questions amongst their group and give a briefing to the rest of the class. I would visit each group for about two or three minutes each, just to ensure that they were on the correct track and to solve any confusions that they might have. While doing this I will also identify the group dynamics like anyone who may be dominating the discussions, how the members are participating in the discussions, and how disagreements are resolved. The groups that did not have any domestic students in them generally seemed a little slower at organizing themselves, but the group dynamics was great. All the members were suggesting ideas and a great deal of healthy discussion would follow. Most of the time, no one would become too dominant and all the members seemed comfortable to take part in the discussion. In the groups where there was one domestic student each, the international students, apart from very few exceptions, were rather hesitant to talk and suggest ideas and issues. They were generally in agreement with the ideas of these domestic students. The domestic students almost always would end up becoming dominant in the discussions and they would be the ones to volunteer most of the ideas and would also lead the discussion their own way. The international students in these groups had to be asked questions directly, and only after a lot of probing will they provide answers and contribute towards the discussions, and even then would look towards the domestic students for support. In one other occasion, a tutorial session was organized around a general classroom discussion. I would pose questions to the class and ask students to answer them. This would then lead us towards a discussion. Using a number of questions and different tutorials, I noticed that if the first student that answered a question was a domestic student, the international students would not want to or were not too willing to participate in discussions. But if the first student to answer was an international student, the other international students were more comfortable to put forward ideas. Once again a number of direct probing questions had to be used to illicit responses from the international students. I have also come to identify that some international students, although may have excellent and innovative ideas, will not suggest and pursue it, and some would even adopt an ‘inferior’ solution if it is suggested by a domestic student. I have explored some of these ideas in some detail in the full paper, but would be happy to hear your thoughts. So what do we mean by internationalising the learning experience?
In a number of previous blogs I have been talking about internationalisation, and also some ideas for embedding international perspectives into the curriculum. Let’s have a look at some of the more curriculum related ideas that can be used to embed internationalisations while designing the learning activities and curriculum. Internationalisation of the learning experiences can take many variations, and most likely implemented gradually as the facilitators become more receptive to the ideas and concepts. At a basic level, it requires students to gain at least some exposure to international ideas, concepts and ways of doing things. These can be through: 1. incorporating ideas, via videos, websites etc. during the delivery of lectures and tutorials so that students are given an opportunity to at least see different perspectives. So when you are looking for examples to demonstrate a concept, aim to identify and use at least one example from a different country. 2. use of international examples in classes. This allows students to experience, albeit at a very basic level, different perspectives from around the world. Students should be required to interrogate these perspectives using their own value positions, and provide balanced justifications for any decisions they may be required to make. These may or may not utilise videos etc. 3. Curriculum should be designed in a way to enable a strength based diversity of ideas and positions. If you are lucky enough to have international students in your classes, engaging them in meaningful ways to provide different ideas and positions. What do I mean by strengths based? All students, international or not, have something unique and significant to offer. If you design your learning activities so that all students get to express their views, not always overtly, then you are creating a more inclusive class. Many international students, due to their cultural backgrounds and experience with different education environments may not willingly offer their own opinions, but appropriately designed learning activities can address this effectively. For example in one of the classes that ‘yours truly’ did a while ago where I had students working in small groups, many students from Confucian heritage backgrounds were willing to accept a domestic students idea over their own, even if in some cases they believed that those ideas were actually inferior to theirs. 4. Offer students the opportunity to work with students physically located in a different country. You might to be surprised to know that academics in other countries are just as interested in developing international perspectives as you are. It would require a bit of work on your part, but seek out potential institutions with similar courses and just contact them. In my case I was able to develop relationships with three different overseas institutions that led to interesting and rewarding activities involving our students. The opportunity to work with group members located overseas creates amazing challenges and learning opportunities for the students. 5. get your students to work on real-life problems that are located in a different country. Seek out significant problems faced by organisations and/or communities around the globe, but focus on a particular country. Get your students to research, identify and develop solutions for these problems. It is also possible to get the students to contact these organisations directly and discuss problems and solutions with them. 6. get the students to work in groups located in a different country, while solving problems located in a third country. So the combination of 4 and 5 above. In one of the previous blogs, I mentioned the relevance of internationalisation the learning experience for our students. The main idea behind internationalisation is that students develop more relevant skills, knowledge and attitudes to operate in a world that is becoming more and more ‘borderless’. Learning activities that enable students to engage with ideas, challenges and solutions from different parts of the world, and experience processes from different parts of the world will allow students to diversify their thinking and approaches to problems.
Many of us, realising the importance of internationalising, have embedded various aspects of internationalisation in our classrooms learning activities. Some of the ways in which we can embed internationalisation perspectives may include:
As outlined in previous blogs, higher education classrooms are becoming more and more diverse. Students from minority groups in the classrooms often face significant challenges, and unfortunately not obvious to most educators. International students, as minority groups in Australia and in the classrooms, face immerse challenges that is magnified by the lack of community and family support outside of the formal education system. Some of these challenges include:
In some classes you sometimes notice students sitting on their own, away from other students. Educators often point out that international students do not take part in classroom discussions and/or ask questions etc. Did you ever find yourself in a situation where you did not know anyone, or did not fully understand the discussions, etc. It’s an uncomfortable situation even for adults, but for teenagers it can be daunting. For example in one research that I did a while ago with a number of my Confucian heritage students in my class, I noticed that they were not offering too much to group work discussions, and particularly concerning for me was that these students were happy to adopt ideas and suggestions offered by domestic Australian students. I started to look more closely at this phenomenon, and identified that even when the ideas and/or suggestions that these international students held back were in fact, in most cases, more superior to what they ended up adopting only because it had been offered by a domestic student. There are a lot more nuanced explanations to this, which might be shared in future blogs. Learning environments that recognise these challenges, and how these manifests in classrooms, and then learning activities that are designed to engage all students are more likely to bring the best in all students. In the case of group work type activities, enable a greater diversity of ideas to be addresses and interrogated. So how can we engage all learners?
Just because we are creating an inclusive curriculum does not mean that we are moving away from the Australian teaching philosophy, quite the contrary….a affair go for all! |
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December 2019
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Photo used under Creative Commons from Philippe Put