A SEED school teacher in Egypt, Abdou values the cultural interaction fostered by collaborative learning.

My name is Abdou Aldoey Ahmed Adam, and I have been a teacher at the Al-Qurna Secondary School in Luxor, Egypt, for 8 years. My school joined the SEED community in 2003. We have about 700 students in grades 10–12.

When I started as a SEED teacher, I became interested in working on scientific problems through the SEED workshops. They discussed many subjects that benefit the environment and all people on the earth, like water, air, and pollution. We also learned about new technologies.

I recently initiated a collaborative project between my class and teacher Cindy Birkner’s class at the Webber Township High School in Bluford, Illinois, USA, with the help of Tom Lough, the SEED scholar-in-residence. Our classes compared the waters of the Nile River and the Mississippi River. The topic of water quality and availability is very important to me, to my students, and to the world. Water means life.

Many of my students who heard about the collaborative project and the new way of sharing information became very interested. With experience, they wanted more. The result was fantastic. Students applied collaborative project skills and increased their scientific knowledge. I learned the style of thinking of the USA students and teachers, how they use the system and prepare all steps before starting in any thing. They want to know all things about the project and arrange all steps in advance.

The Egyptian team compared river sample data from 3 Nile sites with their US collaborators on the Mississippi.

Recently, I was invited to be a co-presenter of the project at the NSTA (National Science Teachers Association) conference in Boston. Unfortunately, I was not able to obtain a visa, so I thank Mohamed El Awadly, a high school biology teacher in Port Said, Egypt, and also a SEED colleague, who presented for me. He is a graduate student at Murray State University, working with Tom Lough.

Although I could not attend the conference, I want everyone to know that the collaborative project is a very useful way for learning, so if any teacher can use it, don't hesitate. I benefited from increasing my information about culture, developing new relationships with students, teachers, and many SEED volunteers who work in Egypt, USA, Russia and other countries. My students are happy for participating and finding new ways of learning. And for my school, this project gave it a special position and reputation. Last but not least, I want to thank SEED Coordinator Mohamed Abbas and the SEED office in Cairo for their support of the project also.

To learn more about the project, see the team report published on the SEED web site.