May 1, 2008 -- After working together for the last 6 months, approximately 1,200 students from 55 schools, representing 15 countries around the world unveiled 13 websites as part of the Global Virtual Classroom Contest 2007/08. Today, contest winners in both the primary and secondary school categories have been announced.
With subjects that range from predicting the future to cultural comparisons of their respective countries, and from sports to self-written fairy tales, sites from participating teams show the kind of creativity that can come from putting children from different cultures together in a collaborative endeavor. Their efforts were judged for content, presentation, and collaboration.
The Grand Prize winner in the younger primary school category, Nishomon Space Station, put together by a team from Israel, the USA, and Japan, provides a creative look at a fictional space station.
Some of the comments from the judges on this site: "Great imagination. The collaboration amongst the schools was very apparent. Liked the way the "We Live In Space" emblem was one of the cards in the memory game - very subtle! I enjoyed visiting your planets and meeting the aliens.", and "The astronauts with the different countries' patches were cool! Nice use of flash at the beginning and your creativity throughout the site was both entertaining and impressive."
In the older secondary school category, the Grand Prize went to a team of students from Japan, Russia and the USA for their site, A Child's World. This site is an pleasant walk through childhood, from the point of view of students who are close enough to it to remember it well.
From the judges: "Very impressive website and huge content. The Quicktime player facilitates video clip management. Engaging. Reflections on how the teams worked were great." and "What a creative site! I loved the music and the pictures. The originality of the stories was wonderful. I loved the photos of the students when they were young and morphed to their current picture. I appreciated reading the reflections and finding out what you learned. Congratulations on your very original work!"
