International Education Exchanges And Intercultural Understanding

This volume examines the complex role of international education exchange in promoting peace and intercultural understanding. The perception that international education encourages greater understanding and cooperation between, people, cultures, and nations continues to drive participation and resources to this growing sector. With thought-provoking theoretical discussions and a broad range of case studies, this volume provides a much needed critical exploration of the ways in which international education exchanges may impact individuals as well as broader issues of global peace and development.

Providing an overview of how online technology is being used for foreign language learning, this title assesses three different models of telecollaboration and covers theoretical approaches to online intercultural exchange as well as practical aspects.

This book explores the nature of intercultural communicative competence (ICC), a set of abilities required to promote sojourner engagement with diversity during study abroad and other educational exchange experiences. A highly original contribution to the intercultural communication literature, this book bases its multinational perspective of ICC on an extensive literary search in six languages and spanning 50 years to identify ICC’s multiple components, to develop a comprehensive assessment tool, and to assess its development and impact on exchange participants in multiple countries.

Short-term student exchanges can offer valuable opportunities for intercultural learning and to engage in intercultural communication using English (the language focus in this Element). However, research and educational practices often assume that the most effective intercultural learning occurs through interactions with local individuals in 'target' culture learning and adherence to standard English language norms. These assumptions overlook important learning opportunities from interactions in culturally and linguistically diverse settings as features of many international exchange experiences. This Element proposes a perspective in student exchange research and practice that reflects this diversity and encompasses the intercultural learning model of intercultural awareness, intercultural citizenship education, and Global Englishes.

This volume provides a state of the art overview of Online Intercultural Exchange (OIE) in university education and demonstrates how educators can use OIE to address current challenges in university contexts such as internationalisation, virtual mobility and intercultural foreign language education. Since the 1990s, educators have been using virtual interaction to bring their classes into contact with geographically distant partner classes to create opportunities for authentic communication, meaningful collaboration and first-hand experience of working and learning with partners from other cultural backgrounds. Online exchange projects of this nature can contribute to the development of learner autonomy, linguistic accuracy, intercultural awareness, intercultural skills and electronic literacies. Online Intercultural Exchange has now reached a stage where it is moving beyond individual classroom initiatives and is assuming a role as a major tool for internationalization, intercultural development and virtual mobility in universities around the globe. This volume reports qualitative and quantitative findings on the impact of OIE on universities in Europe and elsewhere and offers comprehensive guidance on using OIE at both pedagogical and technological levels. It provides theoretically-informed accounts of Online Intercultural Exchanges which will relevant to researchers in Computer Assisted Language Learning, Computer-Mediated Communication, or Virtual Education. Finally, contributors offer a collection of practitioner-authored and practically-oriented case studies for the benefit of teachers of foreign languages or in other subject areas who wish to engage in developing the digital literacy and intercultural competences of their learners.

With the increasing focus on international education and study abroad programmes, Online Intercultural Education and Study Abroad meets the need for a text that addresses ways in which technology may be harnessed to enhance student experience. Combining case studies with theoretical insights, this book critically investigates the effectiveness of a fully online study abroad intervention that was designed to optimise intercultural learning in an international context. Intercultural education researchers and practitioners are provided with theory-based practical ideas such as eLearning strategies and online mentoring tips to help students maximise their intercultural education journey, intercultural competence development, and social engagement while abroad. Both practical and research-focused, this volume considers a wide range of topics, including: Contemporary notions of experiential learning Guided critical reflection through e-mentoring A social contructivist orientation towards eLearning pedgagogy Tools to help understand and measure learner development abroad Online Intercultural Education and Study Abroad is suitable for both novice and experienced study abroad practitioners, researchers, and administrators. Satisfying the growing interest in using eLearning within study abroad programmes, this book will be a necessary point of reference for any institution that aims to enhance international educational experience, especially through the use of technology.

This comprehensive volume provides a state-of-the-art overview of the key issues and developments in study abroad research and practice with a specific focus on the intercultural and language learning dimensions of the study abroad experience. Rather than looking at individual studies, the book seeks to capture the full complexity of the language learning and intercultural dynamics of study abroad by exploring a wide range of topics of particular interest to study abroad researchers and practitioners, including the role of individual differences, identity reconstruction and interculturality, the challenges of assessing learning outcomes, and recent pedagogical interventions designed to enhance and extend language learning and engagement in these contexts. The volume also takes a step back to look at future directions for study abroad research and offers innovative interventions in study abroad programming that emphasise its intercultural elements. This book is an authoritative resource for study abroad scholars and researchers in such fields as intercultural communication, applied linguistics, sociolinguistics, and language education.