ABSTRACT
This chapter is a reflective account about how we, a third-grade classroom teacher at a charter school (Genny) and a South Korean collaborator (Yoo Kyung) from a local university in Albuquerque, New Mexico, built a “sliding glass door” so that students could access a five-week inquiry about South Korea. Two intercultural education models illuminated our questioning and reflections: the Continuum of Intercultural Learning (CIL) by Fennes and Hapgood and the Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity (DMIS) by Bennett. Similarly, Fennes and Hapgood note that there are seven major steps in Continuum of Intercultural Learning (CIL) to move toward intercultural competence: ethnocentrism (resistance), awareness, understanding, acceptance and respect, appreciation and valuing, change, and intercultural competence. The inquiry unit we designed had impressive windows and mirrors and even plenty of “window dressing.” The fancy, main entrance of a building has its universally accessible door opener, but all large buildings have multiple entryways, not just one grand doorway.
