Empower Rural China Students - 21st Century Skills

In past years, Evergreen Education Foundation conferences, workshops, and small projects have been popular and successful programs, which have supported our commitment to educational equity in rural China. Our education committee, headed by Dr. Lili Luo, Dr. Jo Bell Whitlatch, and Jingyi Yu, developed and administered a need-based survey to identify the issues that EEF should focus on for the next year or two. Teacher training, especially on developing informative assessments and rubrics, comes on top of the list. We had two successful pilot projects completed from March through August with encouraging and promising. As we cannot offer in-person workshops and training this year, we are also making progress on effectively communicating with teachers under the new normal of purely online communications.

After surveying Evergreen teachers, the EEF Board identified two initiatives as having the most possibilities for enhancing the learning environment for students in rural China:

1. Explore the potential for online teaching through projects that provide a rich teaching plan, teaching aids, and some new educational concepts; for example “One Window Project” and “One Kilogram Box.” Provide practical training through hands-on project training; train teachers by treating teachers as students working on real projects. Our first step will be to provide a summary of how these programs might be utilized to enhance teaching and learning in rural China.
2. Through financial and information technology support promote the use of Makerspace, STEM education, research on teaching cases, instructional design, and multidisciplinary integration related to STEM education. As part of this initiative, we are exploring potential collaboration worldwide on constructing a website and database for use in locating teaching projects, including topics, content, and how to evaluate student learning.

For students in rural China, well-designed online modules that can be distributed over vast distances have the potential to enhance student success through interactive programs that introduce the latest educational ideas, methods, and interactive projects. Well-designed online modules have the potential to provide rural students with learning opportunities comparable to those students living in urban areas.