International Team Teaching: A Partnership between Mexico and Texas.

This case study reports on collaborative activities among four fourth grade teachers and their students over a year and explores the effectiveness of distance learning for international team teaching. Two classes in Mexico City conducted school activities with two classes in College Station (Texas). Researchers examined: school activities that successfully bring children of Mexican and Texan cultures together to learn with, about, and from each other; similarities and differences in language skills and pastimes between the children of both cultures; and prevailing impressions Mexican and Texan children had of each other prior to their distance learning activities. Activities were designed to help the students understand each other's cultures by walking in each other's footsteps. The investigation relied on arts-based case study methods. Content analyses were conducted of lesson plans and observations, students' poems about the other nation, students' stories about a day in the life of a child in the other culture, student questionnaires, students' collages, and student self-profiles. Mexican children had enough experience of U.S. culture to accurately describe it in poetry. Most Texan children had little knowledge of Mexico and had to write about their own culture, create an imaginary place, or refer to stereotypes in order to create a poem. (Author/ MES)