Yesterday, as part of a intercultural program we have been collaborating with for a couple of years now, we had our first virtual encounter with High School students from Santa Rosa, New Mexico.
It was a great experience for our students at IFIE. This is a new academy here in Cumaná and these group of students have been learning English for one year now.
We are very proud of their ´performance and commitment. This activity will surely motivate them to continue learning the language and reaching out to students from English-speaking countries, or simply kids from anywhere who speak English.
They were very nervous, for obvious reasons. Even we, faculty, get nervous at the prospects of intercultural exchanges. Virtual communitcation is still far from satisfying the demands and nuances of intercultural communication. We had quite a few tech issues and the activity was about to be postponed because of internet problems.
But, we sorted it out at the last minute and were able to have one hour of exchanges of historical and cultural information about national flags, one of the many aspects of our cultures that should help us find common grounds.
Our dear 
She also played a Venezuelan song with her violin.
Professor Nadima Salamasi, Academic Director of IFIE
Some of our students in action (Karla and Jhonny)
They did great and we are very proud of them.
We learned that flags can be a source of pride and patriotism, but they can also be a source of conflict or an instrument of protest. It was very intersting to find commonalities between young people in both countries and their views of national symbols like the flag.
We should have a similar event at the end of the school year. I know these kids will be looking forward to it.
Learning a foreign language is very important, now more than ever, but intercultural communication and academic exchanges of all kids should be a vital part of the learning process. There are pragmatic aspects of the language learning process that we do not learn in a classroom or in isolation.
