Vine Comments

Our students have been participating in this competition for three years. Emphasis has been placed on teaching our students effective communication skills, as well as competing on a global scale. Our Seminar classes have been scholars, involved in research, writing, video development, and computerized processes of putting our project together. The students from each grade who are involved in Web Design have advanced technological skills, while they also have enthusiasm for research topics, and see this collaboration as a method of learning from, and with, people of all ages around the school. It is quite an accomplishment in our society for the classes to work as equals, each with self-chosen roles. Student work started in October, and is part of regular class work. To kickoff the contest, all three schools celebrated with a party, sampling foods from all three cultures. We exchanged pictures, posting our new friends' pictures on the classroom wall. We exchanged cultural stories about thanksgiving and recipes. The students have worked differently this year, in that most of the artwork for the website has been student-generated. We sincerely hope you have enjoyed the unique work created by these very rare students.

Student Comments

I have watched fellow students collaborate a page for this contest in the past, but this is the first time i have been involved with it myself. We have been working on the page since October, meeting our team mates, putting the page together, and posting it up on the internet. One particular day, I worked from 8:00 am untill 6:00 pm, with six fellow classmates, finishing the page for the deadline. I've enjoyed working with various people on this project, and am upset that next year I won't be here to compete again. All I can say is that I wish I had become a part of it earlier than I did. ~Alice Strange

I have wokred on ATT before, but this is the forst time I've really been involved. I did the index drawing and worked on most of the other ones. I only wish I could go back and fix them. I'm a perfectionist. My favorite picture that we did is th satellite. I love watercolor. I really enjoyed watching how different groups do this project. It's been alot of fun. ~Caitlin Cotter

I never thought that I would be at school on a student holiday to work on a project like this, but it was worth it because I got alot done. It was great working with Caitlin to draw most of the pictures that went up on the site. Although I didn't work alot on putting the website itself up, I feel like I've accomplished alot.~Dessa Lohrey

I was at first pretty apprehensive about doing this project because it sounded like a lot of work and well, honestly, I'm not the hardest working person in the world. But once I got into doing the graphics and collecting data, I began to like it more and more. The Virtual Classroom project is a great way to connect classrooms across the world. I'm really glad I was asked to be in it.~Sara Gaddis

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Italy Comments

I think that a better idea of the pertinence of this experience can be gleaned from the students' comments. In spite of the difficulties understanding and writing in a foreign language, in spite of the intense additional work, they were very excited about getting to know their partners, their schools, their habits and about sharing the research. They are feeling as they would if they journeyed around the world! The improvement of their computer and linguistic skills is the direct, and perhaps the less important, consequence of this enthusiasm! ~Sandra Turra, Teacher "Luigi Coletti", Treviso, Italy

In my opinion taking part in this project is a wonderful experience because we could contact American and Australian boys by e-mail. Besides, we have been able to write web pages and sail by Internet. I'm very happy to do this project because I'm living a new experience and I'm meeting some other persons who are very cool; I'm happy also because with this experience I can use the computer better than before. Our team is doing a good work! We hope so to win something because we putted all ourselves in this work, but if we'll not win anything I'll be happy anyway!~Andrea Tognoni

The "Virtual Classroom" project is one of the most beautiful and amusing ways to meet other people. To have new experiences and to make make new firends through the computer and the interenet. The beauty and enjoyment of this project is also using the computer you can learn lots of new things; for example, how to build web pages, or how to use new drawing or graphics programs which help you to modify drawings to send to your virtual partners. Besides "Virtual Classroom," it is another way to to measure your knowledge of foreign languages; communicating with foreign peoples, you must almost have a perfect knowledge of their language. You don't only have to know foreign languages,but you must gather a lot of information on the subject you want to work on. Even if students taking part in it have worked hard spending long hours on it, they are satisfied with their work. ~Giovanni Grauso.

Australia & Vine Photos