This activity can contribute to strengthening students’ linguistic and digital skills. It can help them understand each other, their struggles, differences and similarities and allow foreign students to be more involved with classmates.

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Important note: in order to avoid enhancing the digital gap among students, teachers should make sure that all students have access to the digital resources needed for this activity (e.g.: internet connection; digital devices). Before the activity, give clear instructions and invite participants to ask for clarifications.

Preparation:

• Give each participant a large sheet of paper.

• Explain they have to draw a winding pathway and a circle at its middle.

• On the left, they will write: “road already travelled”.

• On the right, they will write: “the path yet to come”.

• Now, give them some guidelines, following the 4 steps below (you can also download/print them from Annex I.)

 

Step 1. - 30 min

• Divide the class in pairs. 

• Each pair will think about a made-up character who had to leave his/her country and move abroad.  

• Have students try to identify themselves with this character.  

 

Step 2. - 30 min 

• Invite your students to tell their story on ArcGIS StoryMaps: students have the possibility to enrich their stories with different kinds of media, including videos, animations, pictures. 

• Explain how it functions; here you can find some guidelines:  https://geogsteel.wordpress.com/2021/10/13/constructing-powerful-geography-knowledge-through-story-maps/

• Have a look at the examples of stories created in the project Tell Your Story: https://tellyourstorymap.eu/it/stories/

• You may replace StoryMaps with a free blog creator platform, such as Blogger: https://www.blogger.com/about/

 

Step 3. - 60 min 

• Now give time to your students to prepare their story on StoryMaps/Blogger and show to the rest of the class.