Many studies report negative educational outcomes associated with a failure to align student culture and teaching practice and teacher inability to create an environment incorporating cultural sensitivity and understanding of how to interact with families from diverse backgrounds; conversely, study abroad and international professional experience has been shown to enhance intellectual growth, personal development and global-mindedness. This unit's situated learning enables students to experience and contribute to an international social and professional community where personal and professional knowledge, confidence and competence can be developed and enhanced in an educational context. Students will be challenged to make comparisons between the understanding and practices of Australian education and those experienced in an international setting. In so doing, they will develop their professional confidence, flexibility and creativity, as well as their cultural responsiveness through immersion and engagement in an international professional experience placement.

Note: This unit requires the completion of an international professional experience placement. Students must be granted an appropriate travel visa and be able to meet the personal financial costs associated with this placement in order to satisfy unit requirements. Scholarships or other allowances may be available from time to time to aid students to defray the cost of the international professional experience. Students are encouraged to discuss these options with their Program Director.

Learning outcomes

Upon successful completion, students will be able to:
1. Contextualise the contemporary challenges in educational environments, both within Australia and in an international context;
2. Make links between different educational environments, policies and cultures;
3. Participate in teaching and learning in an international professional setting;
4. Develop an understanding of professional culture, structures, practice and ethics of the international professional setting;
5. Demonstrate an enhanced cultural intelligence through engagement with international professionals and peers; and
6. Identify and evaluate effective strategies to address challenges when engaging in professional contexts where the attitudes, values, knowledge and skills of colleagues may be significantly different from their own.

Graduate attributes

1. UC graduates are professional - take pride in their professional and personal integrity
1. UC graduates are professional - work collaboratively as part of a team, negotiate, and resolve conflict
2. UC graduates are global citizens - behave ethically and sustainably in their professional and personal lives
2. UC graduates are global citizens - think globally about issues in their profession
3. UC graduates are lifelong learners - adapt to complexity, ambiguity and change by being flexible and keen to engage with new ideas
3. UC graduates are lifelong learners - be self-aware

Skills development

This unit of study also allows students to demonstrate their capacity to meet the following Australian Professional Standards for Teachers (Graduate Level):

1.3 Demonstrate knowledge of teaching strategies that are responsive to the learning strengths and needs of students from diverse linguistic, cultural, religious and socioeconomic backgrounds.

2.2 Organise content into an effective learning and teaching sequence.

3.2 Plan lesson sequences using knowledge of student learning, content and effective teaching strategies.

3.5 Demonstrate a range of verbal and non-verbal communication strategies to support student engagement.

6.4 Demonstrate an understanding of the rationale for continued professional learning and the implications for improved student learning.

Prerequisites

None.

Corequisites

None.

Incompatible units

None.

Equivalent units

None.

Assumed knowledge

None.