Over the past two years, my fourth graders in Middleton, Massachusetts, worked hand-in-hand (virtually) with a class in Newbury, England, not on a one-time pen pal exchange, but on a sustained, creative, and curriculum-connected collaboration. Together, our students co-authored storybooks, mapped out local landmarks, and reimagined classic literature through a global lens.
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| Students in England and the USA meeting over Google Meet to collaborate on projects |
The most powerful part? The partnership felt real. Tangible. And deeply meaningful for students on both sides of the Atlantic. My students love to say, "My British friends."
This partnership didn’t happen overnight, it was built through curiosity, trust, and the belief that young learners are capable of global thinking when we give them the tools and the space to grow it.
As part of a National Educator Association (NEA) Learning and Leadership Grant I received, I was fortunate to visit this partner school in England this spring. Seeing Burghclere Primary School in action allowed me to reflect on what made this collaboration work and what others might borrow to launch cross-cultural experiences of their own.
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| Visiting Burghclere Primary School in Newbury, England |
1. Start With the Relationship, Not the Project
Find a teacher, not a program, who’s interested in building something with you. My partner in England, Mrs. Field, and I began collaborating through the JDO Foundation. We start each year with a Google Meet for students to exchange student questions and say hello. Over time, that evolves into shared Google Earth projects, book publishing, and real-time feedback loops. Global work is human work. Building relationships makes it possible.
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| Hand-delivered letters, books, postcards, pens and stickers |
2. Make the Curriculum the Bridge
Our students didn’t collaborate “on the side.” Instead, we weave the work directly into our standards-based curriculum. In the project, we collaborated on based on my site visit, students wrote storybooks inspired by Make Way for Ducklings and Paddington. Both take place in our local locations but this time, students made their teachers the main characters. This allowed for lessons in geography, narrative writing, civic pride, and empathy, all through the lens of two cultures meeting.
We relied on tools that made student work visible and interactive: Google Slides for co-writing, Flip for video sharing, Padlet for photo stories, and Google Earth to explore each other's communities. These tools helped bridge the physical distance and gave students a sense of agency and ownership in the process.
4. Visit If You Can But Connect Either Way
My in-person visit to Burghclere deepened everything. I was able to walk the streets students had described, take photos for our collaborative projects, and observe new instructional strategies firsthand. But even without international travel, these partnerships can flourish. What matters most is consistency, creativity, and care.
5. Redefine “Global Competency”
Global education isn’t about one-off festivals or food days. It’s about perspective-taking, collaboration, communication, and curiosity. When students work with peers from another culture, they begin to ask better questions about the world and themselves. That’s the heart of this work.
This year, I watched my students become not just writers or researchers, but bridge-builders. They celebrated each other's voices. They noticed similarities and differences. They stepped into a shared story. Global competencies aren’t extras. They’re essentials and they grow best when rooted in relationships, relevance, and real-world creativity.
If you're an educator wondering where to begin, start small. Start simple. Start by connecting. And if you’d like to connect with me, I’d love to hear from you. Let’s build something global together.
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