Dear Colleagues,

As schools are slowly beginning to reopen throughout Germany, we would like to update you on current changes to our school projects and teacher training sessions. We have received much feedback from participants in the past few weeks and are happy that our online materials are helpful to so many of you as you are navigating the intricacies of distance learning.

Here are our topics for this newsletter:

1. Webinar series: Teaching the U.S. Election 2020
2. U.S. Embassy School Election Project 2020: Register now!
3. Going Green: This school year’s Going Green project is concluding this month, although differently than anticipated.
4. Going Green: Baden Württemberg meets California.

Read more below. We look forward to meeting you virtually in one of our webinars and wish you and yours all the best during these unprecedented times.

Yours,

Joannis Kaliampos
on behalf of the Teach About U.S. Team and Partners 

WEBINARS: TEACHING THE U.S. ELECTION 2020
SAVE THE DATES

U.S. Embassy School Election Project

Due to the corona situation, our teacher training seminars for May and June had to be cancelled. Instead, the U.S. Embassy and Consulates General, Teach About U.S. and a number of local partners throughout Germany will offer webinars on Teaching the U.S. Election 2020.

These webinars will introduce potential participants and future teachers to the format, cutting-edge pedagogical approaches and educational technologies and include input from an American expert on the U.S. elections.

Please register to join the conversation and take part in the Q&A with the faculty. After registering, you will receive a confirmation e-mail containing information about joining the webinar (see link below).

The first webinar session with Dr. David Goldfield and the Teach About U.S. team (May 27, 2020) is already open for registration. Registration for the other two sessions will open shortly. Please note that these sessions will address different topics and feature different U.S. experts, so it’s definitely worth to sign up for all of them.

May 27, 4:00-5:30 PM | Teaching the U.S. Election 2020: Focus on campaigning

Program moderated by Dr. Martina Kohl, U.S. Embassy Berlin

Teaching the U.S. Elections 2020 – Campaigning and Voting in Times of the Corona Health Crisis
Prof. Dr. David Goldfield, Robert Lee Bailey Professor of History, University of North Carolina, Charlotte

Teach About US - Innovative Ways of Teaching English: The Election Project 2020
Joannis Kaliampos, Program Manager, Teach About US, Leuphana University Lüneburg

June 16, time tba | Teaching the U.S. Election 2020: Focus on voting

Program moderated by Dr. Martina Kohl, U.S. Embassy Berlin

Teaching the U.S. Elections 2020 – Campaigning and Voting in Times of the Corona Health Crisis
Prof. Dr. Mark Rozell, Ruth D. and John T. Hazel Chair in Public Policy, School of Policy, Government, and International Affairs, George Mason University

Teach About US - Innovative Ways of Teaching English: The Election Project 2020
Joannis Kaliampos, Program Manager, Teach About US, Leuphana University Lüneburg

June 22, time tba | Teaching the U.S. Election 2020: Focus on social media

Program moderated by Dr. Martina Kohl, U.S. Embassy Berlin

Teaching the U.S. Elections 2020 – Social Media in Times of Limited Campaigning  
Prof. Dr. Terri Towner, Associate Professor of Political Science, Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan

Teach About US - Innovative Ways of Teaching English: The Election Project 2020
Joannis Kaliampos, Program Manager, Teach About US, Leuphana University Lüneburg 

We would like to thank our partners for co-hosting and supporting these events!

SIGN UP
U.S. EMBASSY SCHOOL ELECTION PROJECT 2020

As Americans are launching the primary season in the run-up for the Presidential election 2020, we are getting ready for the U.S. Embassy School Election Project. Though this year’s project format will be similar to the previous project cycles, we are in the process of adding cutting-edge pedagogical approaches and educational technologies. Our Facebook site and the Teach About U.S. Blog will accompany the Moodle course environment.

What’s important now:

• Registration is open now – sign up now for the project
• Join us for the webinars in May and June (see above).
• Classroom materials from the 2016 project are available online; the 2020 curriculum is currently being developed and will become available before the summer holiday.
• We have received the first notifications from U.S. schools who want to be connected to a German partner. Contact us if you are a German teacher and interested starting a transatlantic cooperation.
• If you are an American teacher wanting to be matched with a German partner, pls. contact the Transatlantic Outreach Program (or view our info page for U.S. teachers). 

Projet timeline (tentative)

Project registration is open now!

More information on the project, how to participate, how it works, sample materials, results from 2016, and registration for 2020:

PROJECT CONCLUSION 
GOING GREEN 2019/20 

This project cycle is certainly different from all preceding ones of our Going Green project. Obviously, a regular project conclusion with a face-to-face student conference is not going to be possible. We understand that the current situation may have prevented many of you and your students to carry out your green projects as planned, forcing you to seek different approaches than originally anticipated or delay the timeline for finishing them.

Therefore, we have decided that this year’s competition will recognize not just finished, tried and tested action plans but also work-in-progress reports or blueprints and plans for future actions.

• Have you started working on Going Green but will not be able to finish the action plan?
• Have you and/or your students developed alternative plans for realizing such an interactive project in times of distance learning?
• Have you shifted your focus to address these changed learning conditions, or are your students developing an idea for an action plan that address the current situation directly?

If your answer to any or all these questions is ‘yes’ – we would like to hear from you! Please still upload your project outcomes, work-in-progress or simply send us your ideas, suggestions and wishes. For example, you could do this as a blog post, a short video, photos, or presentations.

In lieu of a final event and formal competition, we would like to honor your contributions in the form of a collage on our website which displays all the creativity and hard work that has gone into this project. If possible and if there is interest, we offer to schedule online meetings with participants and engage in a discussion about the project. Please let us know.

Deadline for uploading or sending your products is May 31, 2020.

» Submit action plan or progress report

LATEST UPDATES
GOING GREEN GOES CALIFORNIA

Besides the national Going Green project cycle, our partners at the German-American Institutes in Baden-Württemberg are organizing a special project for participants in the partner states of Baden-Württemberg and California. The first iteration and deadline for submissions for the special BW-CA competition has been extended to July 3, 2020.

Participating courses are invited to submit their action plans, concept ideas, or even just work-in-progress reports of their green actions via the Virtual Town Hall on the Teach About U.S. platform. As with the national Going Green project cycle, we want to hear from you, even if the current school closures have prevented you from realizing your initial project plans.

If you have any questions about your participation, please don’t hesitate to contact the program coordinator Sarah Taylor at the GAI Tübingen.

Right now, the colleagues in Baden-Württemberg are also seeking potential future participants in California who would like to partner with a German school. Going Green tasks can be integrated with various standards frameworks and school subjects. Most importantly, the project allows for direct transatlantic exchange with German peers.

More information on Going Green in BaWü and CA:

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CONTACT US

Joannis Kaliampos Educational Project Manager Leuphana Universität  Universitätsallee 1, 21335 Lüneburg  Fon +49 (0)4131.677-1662, Email, Web

TEACH ABOUT U.S.

Teach About U.S. is a joint project of the U.S. Embassy Berlin, the U.S. Consulates in Germany, Leuphana University Lüneburg, and LIFE e.V.

Teach About U.S. is a proud recipient of the Germany – Land of Ideas Award 2015 and the Hans Eberhard Piepho Prize for Ideas in Communicative Language Teaching 2013.

FIND MORE RESOURCES ONLINE

www.teachaboutus.org