Inspiring a generation of global learners online

Every three years the OECD runs PISA tests for 15-year-olds, a survey designed to evaluate international education systems. OECD has announced that this year’s PISA tests will measure ‘global competence’, to find out how well students can critically examine local and global issues and understand multiple cultural perspectives.

Cambridge International agrees with the OECD that there is an ever-growing need for interconnectedness among people, countries, and economies as a result of globalisation and the rise of internet technology. 

In the Cambridge Global Perspectives© curriculum, students take ownership of their learning, collaborating with one another on team and individual projects. The curriculum includes important and often controversial topics that affect everyone, like climate change, fuel and energy, and beliefs. These give students a wealth of material and opinion to collect, analyse and reflect on so that they can develop their own thoughts. 

As the need for global perspectives has been created in part due to widening access to global communication platforms, it is fitting that its teaching is supported by its own, bespoke online platform. The Global Perspectives online learning area brings students together to share resources and save their research, collaborate within their school, and work with other communities of Global Perspectives learners around the world. For example, students in New Zealand and the UK used the online platform to collaborate on a project exploring the effects of genetically modified crops. Teachers can also use it to share resources with their class ahead of lessons, review how projects are progressing and connect with fellow Global Perspectives teachers across countries, continents and cultures. 

Teachers can apply for their password at cambridgeinternational.org/registergp and can then ask for passwords for their students. The online learning area is free for all Cambridge schools who offer, or are going to offer, Cambridge Global Perspectives©. By bringing schools together in a virtual space, Cambridge International hopes to inspire a generation of global learners that can think critically about the world around them and foster enhanced understanding of others.

For more: cambridgeinternational.org