GEC Schools - Workshops

The Global Education Centre's Schools team offers a variety of free workshops for teachers and pre-service teachers mainly through Colleges of Education, Teacher Education Centres, Teacher Refresher Course Committee and Teachers Associations.

Our workshops are fun, interactive, useful, and provide teachers with a range of innovative classroom activities.  Participants trial some of the activities in order to enhance understanding of the issues, as well as what it feels like to be on the side of 'learner'. The main themes of the workshops we are currently running are explained below. Your local subject association can contact us for a workshop on a particular topic or level. If you are interested in having us run a workshop on a Global Education-related theme, please contact us.

Teaching with a Global Perspective

We work with participants to develop an understanding of how to teach within the Aotearoa New Zealand Social Studies and Geography curriculum with a global perspective. Our workshops link global issues with particular topics. These topics include refugees in Aotearoa New Zealand and globally, exploring fair and free trade, enquiring into the effects of globalisation and what it means to be a global citizen.

Refugees:A closer look at the situation for refugees globally and in Aotearoa New Zealand. Why do people become refugees and who decides what happens to them? This workshop gives teachers ideas for teaching about refugees in the classroom.

Trade: The global market is increasingly complex and we are all dependent on the hard work of others to be able to purchase goods and services. How do know if we are purchasing goods that rely on the exploitation of others and what can we do about it?

Globalisation:Looking at the bigger picture and at global relationships, the globalisation workshop relates specific issues to both local and international realities.

Global Citizenship: How do we as citizens influence the processes of globalisation and our local scene? We all have rights and obligations and this workshop has a closer look at these.

Global Education: A workshop that looks at how this cross-curricula perspective can enhance classrooms to looking beyond our own cultures.

Poverty: Looking at the very real causes and solutions of relative and absolute poverty all over the world and how this topic can be comprensively taught in the social sciences.

Tourism: The tourism industry is facing huge challenges and this workshop covers the issues of climate change, responsible tourism, cultural tourism and more.

Disparities in Development: This workshop is based around the GEC CD Rom resource, 'Global Disparities' and includes updated material and new ideas and activities for teaching this topic, which does not have to be limited to senior geography.

Sustainable Development: The word sustainable is very trendy, but is it just about recycling? This workshop takes a more wholistic approach to this topic which teachers will find challenging and very relevant. Based around the GEC resouce 'From Middle-earth to your global doorstep; Sustainability in Aotearoa New Zealand and the World', this workshop gives teachers practical activities to engage students in learning about sustainability.

Other Workshops

If there are other global issues that you are interested in, please let us know and we may be able to run a workshop for you on that topic. The Global Education Centre's Schools programme also provides workshops for groups such as UNYANZ, Social Studies Associations, Environmental Educator groups and other groups in the education field who are interested in global issues. We also occasionally host visiting school groups.