session 1 readings, 3/16

I enjoyed the essential question that was addressed at the beginning of the first session: What aspect of what is happening in China affect you? As an educator, I am constantly asking my students to make connections between their personal lives and the literature read in class. I feel fortunate that the session provided different comparisons between magazines (TIME and The Economist), significant incidents (The EP-3 and The Impeccable), and significant figures (Benjamin Franklin and Fukuzawa Yukichi). These few examples allowed for me to see how I am being affected by the international relationships that are taking place. I am excited to be a part of this class and will like to learn more. Moreover, I would like to incorporate my learnings from this class to my teaching practice. I believe that students will benefit very much and I look forward when my students will be able to teach one another about East Asia.

Learning about new cultures and customs is important and exciting. I feel that my knowledge and understanding of the Asian culture will become enriched so that I can share my knowledge with my students. It is important because Asian businesses are spread out through out the world, but very much in the Spanish speaking world, which is what I teach about. I want to be able to make the pertinent connections about the Asian influences in my subject matter.
On a personal level, it is important to be educated on as many cultures from around the world. Hoping to one day I will travel to Asia.
Looking forward to the rest of the sessions!

Hi Folks,
This is the second part of the presentation I showed yesterday. I want to draw your attention to slide 23 (Asian heritage population in the US and especially in California), slide 28 (China's share in 2005 of key commodities, all these numbers are higher today, especially oil, China's now the top importer), and slide 31 (the relative share of various countries in global GDP prior to 1900, note that China and India had 58% in 1750, more than the 33% the US and China have today). I look forward to your comments and questions.

I currently teach government and economics and in the past I have run a Model UN program. I am very interested in comparative government and political theory. It will be interesting to see how Confucian and legalistic ideals have influenced governance in East Asia for multiple millennia and how they still influence society in modern, China, Japan, and Korea. Thinking ahead to my potential lesson plans, I would like to create something on comparative government or international trade.

As a 5th grade teacher, I thought it might be difficult to make correlations between early Chinese history and culture with the 10 year-olds, but I was able to tie in some great facts today regarding overpopulation as well as the water conservation lesson I am currently involved in. We were able to understand the concept of population growth equaling more resource use. The students found particularly strong interest in the One Child Policy and how that might help alleviate water consumption. We had a great debate with those who agreed with the policy, those who did not, and those who supported both sides. The students are very excited to hear that I am taking a class just like them, and I'm particularly excited to see what other connections I can make each week following our Monday sessions.

I enjoyed Monday's lecture/presentation/talk and look forward to attending the seminar. I also enjoyed reading the responses here- it seems we have an enthusiastic group. Let me know which coffee shop everyone is hitting before next class.

This first session is already having me think of the lesson that I will teach my students. Furthermore, I have a new interest in visiting our local Asian cultural spots. Over the weekend I visited the Chinese American Museum which is located near Placita Olvera.