This past year, 2012, has been full of learning for me. I hope that this blog has helped you to learn alongside me! To close out the year, I thought I’d use one of my favorite new skills, making youtube videos, to share my top ten lessons from this year.

10. In Ukraine, I learned that there are some universal truths about the experience of being a kid in school.

9. I also learned how to use video to set up conversations between students from different countries.

8. In Turkey, I learned about the ecology of one of the most interesting landscapes I’ve ever seen: the region of Cappadocia.

7. I also learned how to cook some Turkish foods:

6. In China, I got to see how meaningful service projects can be beneficial to both the people who are serving and those being served.

5. I also learned about many different aspects of Chinese culture, which in many ways, is very different from what I am used to experiencing in the United States.

4. After all of this travel, I’ve learned a lot of new skills to bring back into my classroom here at home.  I’m very proud of our Global Citizenship Projects which students created last spring. I learned how to give students more say in creating original projects.

3. I’ve also been working to help students make more of their own videos, and was very proud of their memory tricks videos from this fall.

2. In addition to doing this work in my own classroom, I’ve been learning how to share it with other teachers. I’ve now given presentations to colleagues in the Teachers for Global Classrooms program, at Innovation Academy, and at EdCamp conferences. I also created a global education resource guide for teachers, with this introduction video that I’m really proud of:

1. Last but not least, my number one lesson of 2012 has been to work on appreciating the little stuff. Big or small, there are lessons to be learned around every corner. Even while eating lunch at a picnic table…

It was very hard to choose my ten favorite videos. This blog, Innovation on Earth, has had quite a first year. Though I had never really blogged much before, this year I wrote 129 posts and uploaded over 1,000 photos and videos. It’s been viewed more than 35,000 times from 109 different countries! Whew! If you want to explore more, there are a few ways to do that:

* To watch other videos, check out my YouTube channel, InnovationOnEarth.

* To view past posts, explore the blog more! You can search…

• by country (Ukraine, Turkey, China, or US — by mousing over the word blog in the top menu)
• by key word (using the search menu on the right side bar)
• by popular topic (clicking one of the topics shown in the word cloud on the right side bar)
• by date (using the archives menu at the bottom of the right side bar)

* To find out about future posts and videos, you can…

• Like my Facebook Page: www.facebook.com/InnovationOnEarth
• Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/globetwisting
• Sign up to get emails when there’s a new post by clicking the “follow” button on the right sidebar

Thank you to all of my readers in 2012! I wish you another year full of even more learning and fulfillment than the last one. One of my goals is to reach even more people in 2013 using this site. If you’ve enjoyed reading this blog, please share it with a friend or two, and consider leaving me a comment with some feedback about what you’d like to see more of.  I look forward to expanding our learning community in 2013!  Speaking of that, it’s already the new year in Ukraine, Turkey, China, and many other parts of the world. Here on the East Coast, it’s getting to be time to celebrate, so I have to get offline. Happy new year everyone, near and far!