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Program for Teaching East Asia receives new funding, expands online programs and Korea offerings

This year, TEA passes a milestone of 18 years of continuous funding as one of the five founding centers directing the National Consortium for Teaching about Asia. Through generous and long-term funding from the Freeman Foundation, NCTA offers professional development in the form of online courses, summer institutes, study tours, and workshops to K-12 teachers throughout the United States. Complementing NCTA programming, TEA has received two new grants from the US-Japan Foundation and Korea Foundation, and continues to build its national reputation in professional development programming for Chinese language teachers through the federally funded StarTalk project.

NCTA: New in 2015-2016. NCTA offerings through TEA served over 300 teachers through intensive online courses and summer institutes in the past year. TEA’s research faculty developed new online courses on contemporary Japan, Korea, and demystifying the Samurai, as well as adding several new online book discussion groups to our offerings. Our 2015 summer institute, which hosted 20 secondary teachers, focused on China’s political system, and featured CU PhDs Jessica Teets and Orion Lewis, both political science faculty at Middlebury College, as well as CU historian Tim Weston.

The new NCTA initiative, “Class Apps,” launched in 2014 has expanded to a library of 18 short video presentations by experts on topics of use for classroom teachers.  Six titles were added in 2015, with another eight planned for 2016. New topics include Learning to Read Japanese Paintings by art historian and CAS Event Coordinator Carla Stansifer;  Cultural Appropriation vs. Appreciation, by art historian and CU Asian studies alumna Melanie King; How to Teach Critical Thinking Using Samurai, by historian Ethan Segal; New Media and Censorship in China, by political scientist Orion Lewis. New Class Apps planned for 2016 include an interview with author Eric Fish, a critical analysis of European and Japanese “medieval” periods, and a look at geographic controversies between Japan and Korea.

New Japan Programming: “Olympic Opportunity: Re-prioritizing Japan in the Classroom. In summer 2015, TEA concluded a successful three-year project, “Japan: Online Professional Programs for Teachers. Funded by the Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership, this project produced eight online courses that provided professional development for over 500 elementary and secondary teachers. As this project drew to a close, TEA received new funding from the US-Japan Foundation to develop a series of new summer institutes, online courses, online resources, and a summer study tour over the next three years. The project, directed by TEA Director Lynn Parisi, will draw upon the opportunities offered by the five-year period leading up to the 2020 Olympics to promote and facilitate enriched, expanded, and timely teaching and learning about Japan in the secondary curriculum. This funding, with NCTA funding, will underwrite TEA’s 2016 summer institute, “Japan’s Olympic Challenges: 20th-Century Legacies, 21st-Century Aspirations” which explores the intersection of Japan's post-WWII past and 21st-century future through the lenses—and teaching opportunities—of pivotal anniversaries and preparation for the 2020 Olympics.

Korea Foundation funding for summer workshop continues. Along with NCTA funding, a second year of funding from the Korea Foundation will support a four-day summer program for 30 secondary teachers from across the United States. Korea’s Journey into the 21st Century: Historical Contexts, Contemporary Issues will consider modern and contemporary South Korea’s distinct history, geography, intra-peninsular and international relations, and transnational cultural transmissions (e.g., K-pop, film, and design). Directed by TEA’s Korea Projects Coordinator Catherine Ishida, the workshop will also including CU history professor Sungyun Lim and other Korea specialists. 

Startalk:  Chinese Language Instruction in the Digital Age. TEA extended its programming in Chinese language pedagogy, receiving its fifth grant from the federal STARTALK program in 2015.  The 2015 program hosted 18 secondary Chinese language teachers from around the United States.  A highlight of the 2015 program impact was the implementation of technology into Mary Ann Durso’s class in the Chicago Public Schools, which garnered attention from the Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Emanuel visited Durso’s class in fall 2015 and commented on exemplary student-centered technology that helps her students actively learn the language.