EASC offers professional development opportunities for K-12 educators throughout the academic year. Here you can find our upcoming NCTA short courses and webinars, as well as see courses that have been offered in the past.
EASC's online professional development opportunities are open to all K-12 educators and pre-service teachers.
Webinar Date: August 30, 2025
Registration Deadline: August 25, 2025
Instructor: Yuyuan Zhang, PhD Candidate, IU Department of History and Religious Studies.
In this webinar Yuyuan Zhang will lead participants through the prehistory of area studies in the West, specifically in Western Europe between the 16th and 18th Centuries. During this period, the study of the world underwent a transition from a Christian, biblical world-historical perspective to an Enlightenment, secular world-historical view. The protagonists in this story are the Jesuits missionaries and Enlightenment philosophers. The changing attitudes towards China, its history, and religions reflect the shift in European intellectual atmosphere. Tracing the early history of studying the East, Yuyuan invites teachers to reflect on how different historical perspectives shape our ways of knowing the world and how we should position ourselves in the K-12 education setting
This webinar offers teachers 2 professional development hours. For any questions reach out to easc@iu.edu
Registration ClosedCourse Starts: August 31, 2025
Course Ends: September 20, 2025
Registration Deadline: August 24, 2025
This asynchronous NCTA short course guides participants on an exploration of Chinese literature and culture through the lens of imagination and fantasy. This course will help teachers explore Chinese literature through a focus on the rich cultural presentations of individual freedom and contemplation on divergent systems, worldly and otherworldly. The materials explored will help teachers better understand the continuing recycling and development of classical images and stories in Chinese imaginative literature through cutting-edge global and American cultural production, such as Gene Luen Yang’s American Born Chinese and the Academy Award winner Everything Everywhere All at Once. This course offers teachers 6 professional development hours. For any questions reach out to easc@iu.edu
Registration Closed
Course Starts: October 05, 2025
Course Ends: October 18, 2025
Registration Deadline: September 27, 2025
This asynchronous NCTA short course guides participants on an exploration of themes prevalent in the post-Korean War era in South Korea; themes such as economic hardship, family troubles, refugee status, and the clash of old and new values. Using the lens of the lower and refugee classes, participants will focus on two films exploring what the immediate post-war era was like for those of the periphery during the beginning of industrialization in the capital city Seoul. These two films offer opposite endings, hopeful and bleak, to contrast and highlight the fears, insecurities, dreams, and hopes that many families faced during this turbulent time. This course offers teachers 3 professional development hours. For any questions reach out to easc@iu.edu
Registration Closed
Webinar Date: October 25th, 2025
Time: 10:00am - 12:00pm ET
Registration Deadline: October 19, 2025
Instructor: Chi Feng, PhD Student, IU Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures.
Discover how music shaped life in early China—and how you can bring that story into your own classroom. This webinar will provide background knowledge and practical strategies to help educators bring materials about early Chinese music into their classrooms. Participants will explore three key ideas: that ideas of music vary widely across human societies, that music can be studied even without access to recordings, and that music in early China was deeply tied to ritual and politics. Alongside this content, Chi will lead participants through a discussion about adaptable classroom strategies, such as analyzing images of ancient instruments, listening to reconstructed sounds, and comparing ancient and modern ideas of music, that can spark curiosity and discussion among your students.
This webinar offers teachers 2 professional development hours. For any questions reach out to easc@iu.edu
Webinar Date: October 23th, 2025
Time: 6:00pm - 7:30pm ET
Registration Deadline: October 19, 2025
Instructor: Dr. Morten Oxenbøll, Dept. East Asian Languages and Cultures, Indiana University
In this lecture, we will dive into the world of outcasts and marginalized groups in early medieval Japan. We will explore how groups like the hinin as well as female entertainers (shirabyōshi) constructed semi‐autonomous communities that constantly negotiated boundaries with mainstream society and even with the imperial court. Though the work these groups performed was often socially despised, it remained indispensable to the functioning of the state. Join us as we trace how those relegated to society’s margins were simultaneously defined by, and essential to, the social order itself.
This webinar offers teachers 2 professional development hours. For any questions reach out to easc@iu.edu
Registration ClosedWebinar Date: November 05, 2025
Time: 7:00pm - 8:30pm ET
Registration Deadline: November 03, 2025
Instructor: Maya Best, Ph.D. Student, IU Department of Sociology
In this webinar, Maya Best will introduce participants to the experiences of refugees in Japan as they navigate the country’s strict immigration policies. Japan’s aging population and declining birthrates has resulted in an increase in dependency on temporary foreign workers to address labor shortages. Yet, Japan maintains one of the lowest refugee acceptance rates among the developing nations, making it exceptionally difficult for asylum seekers to settle permanently.
This presentation will offer a comprehensive overview of Japan’s refugee policies and their broader social implications, along with strategies and resources for educators to implement into their classrooms. Participants will explore multiple perspectives in this disputed issue, which represent the conflicting viewpoints of the Japanese Ministry of Justice, refugees in Japan, migrant rights nonprofits in Japan, and Japanese locals with anti-immigrant sentiments. The session will also highlight the challenges facing marginalized refugees in Japan and the many local Japanese organizations working to support them despite strict governmental barriers to immigration. Maya will also share her own personal experiences engaging with refugee communities in Tokyo through past research and volunteer work.
Educators will be encouraged to reflect on how transnational approaches to global issues can foster critical thinking, dialogue, and cross-cultural awareness among K-12 students.
This webinar offers teachers 2 professional development hours. For any questions reach out to easc@iu.edu
Webinar Date: November 22, 2025
Time: 10:00am - 12:00pm ET
Registration Deadline: November 17, 2025
Instructor: Yunmeng Zhang, Ph.D. Student, Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies, IU School of Education
This webinar, taught by PhD student Yunmeng Zhang, will guide participants through urban life in China with a focus on two major cities, Shanghai and Chengdu. Participants will explore the cultural, economic, and historical distinctions between these two cities to better understand how different urbanization policies and regional identities shape everyday life in China. Through this, educators will be empowered to facilitate discussions on urban Chinese life, policies, and identity in their own classrooms.
This webinar offers teachers 2 professional development hours. For any questions reach out to easc@iu.edu
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