Generation Global Newsletter - Issue 4, 2022

Welcome to our final Newsletter of 2022! Generation Global has reached over 19,000 young people from 90+ countries this year. New schools, learners, and educators joined us on a journey to prepare the next generation to become global citizens from 10+ new countries, including Japan, Congo, Belize, Brazil, Malawi, Moldova, Kosovo, and many others. We partnered with Lead for Ghana, Commonwealth Education Trust, YuWaah – Generation Unlimited in unlocking young people’s potential to dialogue with one another, and became proud members of the UNESCO Global Skills Academy. We are celebrating this quarter even more than the previous one!  

We launched a new global topic of Digital Wellness for young people, a professional development course for educators called ‘Introduction to Dialogue,’ and redesigned our teacher dashboard. Our downloadable resources on Climate Change and Wealth and Poverty have been updated and are great to teach UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 1 and 13.

There is also a special section in this newsletter about things to look out for in the coming year – A January SDG Dialogue Series, a new calendar of virtual dialogue sessions and more! So, don’t forget to scroll down to the last section for a few surprises.  

We wish you and your loved ones Seasons Greetings and warm wishes for the coming year. We hope that this holiday season brings you faith, hope, and peace. 

Best wishes, The Generation Global Team

A new ‘Digital Wellness’ topic for young people to create safe experiences online

Technology and online spaces are a necessary part of young people’s life, and it is important that they understand how to stay safe and healthy online. To address this need, we have launched a new topic on the Ultimate Dialogue Adventure (UDA): Digital Wellness!

Using this topic, young people can explore how to manage and co-create a safe online user experience for themselves and their global peers, whether through the UDA or via other social media sites.

‘Introduction to Dialogue’ course launched for educators

In September, we launched our first online professional development course for educators with an online webinar in which experts and practitioners discussed the importance of intercultural communication for Global Citizenship. If you missed the webinar, watch it here! 

Also, if you want to advance your professional journey and incorporate dialogue into your learning community, sign up for the course on our Teacher Portal and take this certificate course for free.

Our Teacher Portal dashboard has a new look

The Teacher Portal dashboard has been updated with a new design for easy navigation and the updated interface provides quick access to everything you can do at Teacher Portal at a glance. We are sure that you will enjoy using it! 

Log in to our teacher portal to see the new look for yourself.  

Updated Climate Change and Wealth and Poverty resources

We have updated our Climate Change and Wealth and Poverty teaching materials to support educators in teaching about these important topics in the classroom while building on dialogue skills. Each resource includes skill-building activities, lesson plans, reflection exercises, and video conferencing preparation tips. 

These resources can be used to teach a full unit or as individual lessons for learners ages 13-17 in any educational setting. They are also great for teaching about UN SDG 1: No Poverty and SDG 13: Climate Action! Download the free resources by signing up here.

Photo Contest on Well-Being

We launched a well-being photo contest for young people aged 13 to 17 to learn what this means to them and what they do to maintain their well-being.

We asked for a real-life photo, a collage, a painting, a sketch, or anything else that represented their sense of well-being, and we received over 330 entries from young people from over 15 countries. The top three winners of this year’s photo contest are Dipesh (India), Polina (Ukraine), and Gaurav (India). Find the winning photos here.

Sharing Experiences Matters - Big or Small 

Yamun, a Generation Global alumni moderator from India, writes in a blog that “there are no restrictions on sharing, no matter how big or small you think it might be, because your unique perspective as a young person might lead to a breakthrough discovery.”

In his blog, he shares quick tips for making sharing experiences more effective and memorable for young people when interacting in physical space or virtually through video conferences. Read the blog here and share it with young people you know. 

Generation Global educator wins Outstanding Teacher and Education Personnel Award 2022

Ahmad Thohir Yoga, a Generation Global educator from Indonesia, has been awarded the Outstanding Teacher and Education Personnel Award (GTK) 2022 by Ministry of Religious Affairs in Indonesia. He was one of the three finalists from among 5,000 teachers and received this award for his innovation in global citizenship education for madrasah students using the Ultimate Dialogue Adventure. 

Yoga says, “Through the Ultimate Dialogue Adventure (UDA), students not only learn English, but can learn about 21st century skills, namely global communication, active listening, critical thinking, questioning, and reflecting”. Read more about his big win here. 

Generation Global at DigCit Connect

Our Director, Lucy Hayter, conducted a session at DigCit Connect - a virtual summit produced by the DigCit Coalition in partnership with ISTE and the Los Angeles School District’s Instructional Technology Initiative (ITI), where she discussed about practical approaches for supporting young people in our highly digital world. 

Participation in Global Learning for an Open World (GLOW) conference

Generation Global offered a session entitled ‘Transferable Skills: Tools for Youth Voice and Agency Through Dialogue’ at the 2022 Global Learning for an Open World conference. The session explored why integrating dialogue as a key learning strategy is essential and how it provides tools for supporting youth voice and agency in developing core skills for intercultural communication. 

Generation Global at the TVET launch in Bonn

Lucy Hayter, Generation Global Director, spoke about the programme and its importance in education in providing core communication skills to young people as they transition into technical and vocational opportunities. She presented this on a panel with other Global Skills Academy members at the UNESCO Strategy for Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) launch in Bonn in November.

SDG Dialogue Series is coming back in January 2023! 

Generation Global is coming back with the SDG Dialogue Series in January 2023. This series is designed for young people ages 13-17 to learn about the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) through interactive learning activities and share their experiences with global peers through virtual dialogues.   

Over a four-week period beginning January 23rd, participants will learn about SDG 4: Quality Education, SDG 10: Reduced Inequalities, SDG 13: Climate Action, and SDG 1: No Poverty. Participants will earn a certificate when completing one or more topics or a special digital golden badge for completing all four SDGs. All details to sign up can be found on the dedicated page.

Virtual dialogues for young people 

Educators can now incorporate our 10+ global topics into the subjects you teach in your classroom and invite your students to learn, connect, and share about global issues through live facilitated video conferences. 

We invite you to explore the global topics we have available for young people and select from 500+ live dialogue sessions taking place across different time zones on various topics for them to interact with global peers. Log in to the Teacher Portal to find out more!

Educator Awards Winners to be announced 

In March, we will announce the educators who qualified for the Educator Awards in three categories: gold, silver, and bronze. Keep an eye out for all the winning educators who have excelled at incorporating dialogue into their learning communities and preparing their students to be global citizens. 

If you want to learn more about our Educator Awards 2023, click here and stay tuned for applications to be open for 2023.