‘I would thoroughly recommend schools to become involved in a Connecting Classrooms partnership. Programmes like this can enhance a school’s unique identity, enriching both learning and teaching experiences.’ Kerri Reid, Principal Teacher and International Co-ordinator, Muthill Primary School, Scotland
The opportunity
It was more than ten years ago when Muthill Primary School, Scotland, and Juliet Johnson School, Ghana, started an international partnership to give students and their families the chance to develop attitudes about the world they live in and the part they can play. Since then, the two schools have built a strong connection that has embraced the wider school communities and continues to inspire learners long after they have moved on to further stages of their education.
Support from Connecting Classrooms has given the schools the opportunity to enrich their partnership, through reciprocal visits and collaborative projects, with a focus on core skills and global issues. This work has helped to shape practices and approaches in both schools, and has put sustainable development issues at the heart of teaching and learning.
Shaping the curriculum
To achieve success and make the most of collaborative learning, the schools have worked to ensure partnership projects are integrated into existing curriculum topics, rather than being an add-on. This helps to provide a relevant context and purpose for learning. In Muthill, topics and issues explored through the partnership have had a significant impact on the future focus of learning. ‘I think our longstanding partnership has actually shaped our curriculum,’ says Principal Teacher and International Co-ordinator Kerri Reid. ‘Sustainable education and children’s rights are embedded into the curriculum and are at the heart of our school’s rationale.’
Partnership projects have added depth and breadth to learning and pupil experiences, including a wealth of incidental learning. Various opportunities to share and learn with one another across countries, shaped by skilled teacher questioning, have enhanced exploration of big issues, supported critical thinking and helped to relate learning to a more global setting. This way of working has created exciting and relevant learning contexts, where pupils learn with, through and about one another. They naturally discuss and compare similarities and differences within a shared topic, which helps them to view issues from more than one perspective and develop ‘glocal’ thinking.
A focus on sustainable development
Joint curriculum projects have covered various aspects of sustainable development, including Fairtrade farming, society and culture, ecology and children’s rights. As the partnership has progressed, the focus has moved beyond knowledge and understanding of the Global Goals, to encouraging and motivating pupils to take action. Learners have all committed pledges to the Global Goals, and have planned campaigns through the Blue Capes: Global Game Changemakers programme, and shared these between the schools.
During an interdisciplinary project on water, learners in Muthill were quick to link access to clean water with the children’s rights. Whilst recognising that their partner school did have access to clean water, learners decided themselves to research areas of Ghana where sanitation is poor. They then planned and held their own community event to raise awareness of sanitary issues. The event raised enough money to buy a toilet for a village in Northern Ghana.
This example of students taking the lead in their learning, by following up on topics and taking action on issues that matter to them, has been key to the success of the partnership. ‘The most successful projects we have undertaken have been when the pupils have said what they would like to work on next,’ says Kerri.
Sharing through creativity
A favourite activity for learners in both schools has been to write songs and make music videos to share with each other. This began when the schools wrote and performed their own songs about water conservation, and shared the videos, leading to the schools creating a joint song about children’s rights, with Muthill students writing the words and music and Juliet Johnson students being responsible for choreographing. Their most recent collaboration was a music video to promote the Global Goals. Vocals and visuals were recorded in both schools and have been merged into a joint video - Global Goals song (embed link)
During these projects, the partners realised that Juliet Johnson teachers and learners could use technology more effectively than their counterparts at Muthill. So, throughout the process, they gave advice on how to edit recordings and create DVDs.
Sustainable impact
Over the course of the partnership, the schools have sought to involve the wider community, either through cultural events during reciprocal visits, or by involving pupils, staff and parents in the evaluation process. The partnership has laid a strong foundation for other aspects of the schools’ sustainable development work, and is viewed as a unique, value-added aspect to the schools.
The positive impact of the partnership was highlighted in Muthill’s most recent HMI inspection, which stated: ‘outstanding approaches to learning about sustainability, citizenship and global issues. The school’s work over the last decade in this area is making a real difference to children, the local community of Muthill and a community further afield in Ghana.’
For Kerri, the clearest example of long-term impact was traveling to Ghana with two 16-year-old ex-pupils, who had saved their own money and fundraised to be able to visit their old partner primary school. Those students, as well as many of their peers, have maintained and interest in Ghana, which began when they were just eight years old.
