Distance and e-learning opportunities

The next months offer interesting e-learning opportunities, including the new Distance Sessions that will be offered to participants of the AFS Intercultural Link Learning Program. These Distance Sessions represent an opportunity for AFSers already enrolled in a level of the program to continue developing and improving our intercultural learning from their home countries. But if you are not a participant, there are also other ways in which you can experience e-learning!

A specific e-learning opportunity for interculturalists is this webinar offered by Young SIETAR on social media: Interculturalist: From Social Media Users to Marketers. This webinar will be a synchronous session offered on 22 April, from 7 to 8 pm BST. There are also other interesting e-learning opportunities available on Coursera. We have picked some sessions in the area of education that might be appealing to you, but we recommend that you explore the site to see what matches your preferences:

Coursera is one of several educational endeavors to make higher education accessible through the web. Higher education institutions are also trying to make their courses more accessible through initiative like edX or Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s MIT OpenCourseWare. The purpose of these educational sites is to make more university-level content accessible and free of charge for people around the world.

We encourage you to sign up for at least one of these events and tell us what you think about the potential of e-learning in your educational experience and in learning from any corner of the world.

Deep Culture Learning | Webinar with Young SIETAR

Young Sietar is an international organization of young professionals in the field of Intercultural Learning that regularly provides its members webinars on numerous intercultural topics. One of these, an online webinar on “Deep Culture Learning: The Cognitive Unconscious and the International Brain” will take place on September 15, 2012 at 12:00 – 1:00 pm BST (British Summer Time). To check availability and to register for this webinar, click here.

This webinar addresses the fundamentals of neurology, cognition, and perception and by presenting the concept of “Deep Culture Learning” Joseph Shaules, author of the book Deep Culture: The Hidden Challenges of Global Living, invites participants to discover ways to get in touch deeply with a new culture - beyond the tip of the iceberg. Shaules argues that if we learn a culture, we will more deeply impact our brain’s unconscious “Auto-Pilot”, also known as our “Cognitive Unconscious”.

Joseph Shaules is an intercultural educator who has worked and lived in Japan, Mexico, and Europe for more than 20 years. He is now an associate professor at the Rikkyo University Graduate School of Intercultural Communication, Tokyo. He is the author of many books, including “Beneath the Surface: A Beginner’s Guide to the Deep Culture Experience” (Intercultural Press); “Identity” (Oxford University Press), and “Deep Culture: The Hidden Challenges of Global Living” (Multilingual Matters). Shaules works, thinks, and writes in English, Japanese, French and Spanish.

As an educational organization, AFS offers young people the opportunity to spend time abroad and to engage in intercultural learning. With support from volunteers and staff who have knowledge of intercultural concepts and skillful ways of applying that knowledge, the experience of each participant is shaped. Shaules’ webinar can be an opportunity to get deeply involved with intercultural learning, and to reflect on its importance for the contemporary world.

To learn more about Young Sietar, sign up for the 13th Annual Congress 2012, taking place from 6-9 September 2012 in Belfast, Northern Ireland!