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Abstract
Students are participating in global education programs in schools today. The objectives for these global programs include preparing children intellectually and social-emotionally to be able to communicate and understand others from around the world, as well as encouraging children to develop a global view in their thinking about others in the world (Zhao, 2010). This qualitative research study was designed to find out how middle school students demonstrate emotional intelligence, specifically empathy, when participating in eight cross-cultural, academic English lessons with students from China and the USA via the technology of videoconferencing. The intent was to identify and recognize responses, reactions, and reflections through the words, behaviors, gestures, attitudes, and/or expressions of the middle school students that showed empathy through an understanding of feelings within themselves and/or concerning others during/or related to the lessons. A variety of methods were used to collect data during the eight lessons including two different emotional intelligence assessment tools, informal testing, observations, interviews, and journal writing. The data was coded and aligned with the research questions to provide results about empathy as it relates to the middle school students in this study.
With the advancements in technology, school communities all over the world are able to communicate and share academic lessons with one another (Lin & Yang, 2011). Understanding how middle school students demonstrate empathy during videoconferencing lessons provides schools the evidence and knowledge needed to assist students so they can grow emotionally when participating in the lessons. The current research to understand empathy in middle school students during videoconferencing lessons is limited and therefore gives teachers little insight on how students respond emotionally during videoconferencing lessons. This lack of research contributes to the need for more research to take place in this specific area of empathy.
