An Instructional Design for International Collaborative learning Focusing on Communication.

he advantages of the Internet enable teachers in the world to break the communication barriers between their schools and collaborate with each other, giving them opportunities for richer educational practices than ever accomplished. I assume that collaborative learning like an international exchange naturally lead the students to acquire the knowledge to communicate with their peers using ICT skills. In this paper, two international exchange projects that have years of practice are reported, i.e., new types of collaborative education projects that the development of the Internet has enabled us to carry out. The international exchanges reported here have been possible because both students and teachers have effectively used the various functions of the Internet. To use English as a “common international communication language” is particularly important for the youth in Asia, and the students have come to realize the importance of English as a communication language through these projects. Also, since these practices are based on the infrastructure of the Internet, they have elucidated what kind of Internet use produces richer educational results .At the final stage of the exchanges, “joint presentation in English” is designed. Students communicate and collaborate over the network, and finally meet with each other and try to give a presentation as a product of their collaborative work. The files and scenes of their presentations are stored on the network and used as educational materials in Asia as well as models for the activities in the following years. We will report how to design international exchange education in this Internet age.