Clean Air Challenge in the news!
- Clean Air Challenge - 2009 Workshops In China
- The Summer 2009 Clean Air Challenge trip to China was quite a success! We visited 3 major cities including Beijing, Chengdu and Shanghai. In all we trained over 100 enthusiastic Chinese teachers in the CAC curriculum. The Clean Air Challenge is a new and exciting approach to teaching for these Chinese educators, and therefore, was received with much anticipation and interest! The majority of teaching in China revolves around lecture and direct instruction so the presentation of an interactive, hands-on, lab- based, student- centered curriculum was fascinating, motivational and most of all FUN! Teachers were eager to learn about particulate matter, ozone formation and measurement as well as health related effects. As a result, they wanted to do all the labs! They were interested in every facet of the Clean Chair Challenge curriculum and how they could present it to their students. There seemed to be an immediate realization of just how important this information and type of education is, not only to their students but to their country as well. A primary motivational technique in Chinese classrooms is competition. We, therefore, used this strategy with the teachers during our training and the results were phenomenal! Teachers engaged in friendly competitions while completing each lab activity. They not only tried to finish each lab first but they were also invested in completing each activity correctly and accurately. The final competition with the hydrogen fuel cell cars was intense and dynamic! Training these dedicated, hard-working educators was an honor and a privilege. I was extremely impressed with how innovative, dedicated and motivated they are. As our hosts, they were welcoming, gracious and grateful. I can only hope these trainings are the beginning of a committed path to teach students about the importance of clean air in their community and around the world.
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