The 21st Century Skills program kicked off with Professor Suzanne Orzech from the United States and three sessions split into two groups filled with over 50 students from every corner of the globe. This COIL program allows students in varying time zones to participate by either joining the live lecture or watching on-demand lessons. Despite the time zones, students tuned in live from around the world, from countries such as the Netherlands, Mongolia, Chile and South East Asia. 

 

The themes of Professor Suzanne’s sessions were focused on teamwork, creativity and collaboration. In the first session the theme was “ice breakers” as this was the first opportunity to meet all the member participants and login to their ImmerseU class pages. The class began with an ice-breaker question taken from a virtual “wheel of questions” spun at the start of lesson. The topic - “What is something you’ve always wanted to try but have been too afraid to?” Questions such as this help create a welcoming and familiar atmosphere for students, sharing their hopes, dreams and fears with other members. Students shared their answers while introducing themselves. Some answers were “trying out new sports”, “creating travel videos on Youtube” and “ice skating.” Following this activity students were asked to identify “soft skills” and list 5 skills they feel are important. The class ended with a short video titled “bad teamwork versus good teamwork” which prepared the students for their upcoming collaborative assessment. 

 

 

In session 2 the students focused on teamwork and collaboration. The video lesson themes for the day were “seven lessons for collaboration” - these included ownership, dependability, a shared vision and others. These lessons helped students navigate their teamwork activity which was to plan “The Epic Dinner party.” Students were given 40 minutes in small breakout rooms to create their epic dinner party using the parameters given, working together to achieve a collective goal.

 

 

After the first 2 sessions both groups of students were much more relaxed and comfortable sharing with each other. The third session started with the warm up questions from the “wheel of questions” which was - “what is the meaning of peace to you?” After discussing their answers the students learnt about developing their creativity, thinking both outside and inside the box and were introduced to the theme of their summative assessment “What if…” They watched a video titled “What if everyone had a free basic income.” The students broke off into their groups, finding their team leaders and eventually discussing their many “what if…” scenarios that will be used for their final assessment.