If the world could teach me, I'd sing

I've had this idea for a media project kicking around in my head for over a year now. The basic idea is to  collect art and poetry from a cross-section of the world's children addressing a single theme. For it to work, there would have to representation from all corners of the globe, and as many diverse cultures as possible.

Right now, the question I've settled on is, "If you could be any creature, real or imagined, what would it be?" (Although that's not final at this point.) The children would be asked to write and/or illustrate their choices with a short explanation.

I know it's an extremely ambitious idea, and to do it right would take a tremendous amount of effort and a good amount of time. I could "crowd source" the initial stages by having kids submit their art electronically to a blog or website, but that would potentially exclude a big demographic. Plus I'd like to find a way to personally visit these communities as much as possible. So, I think there would need to be a bit of both electronic and in-person solicitation for material. Ideally it would be coordinated through local school systems.

As a website, the project could be continually evolving, especially if it's built on an open-source content management platform such as Joomla, where contributors could post their material directly to the site. This would also make it possible to submit all types of media (images, video, audio, etc.).

I'm writing this post as a way to concretize my thoughts on the project, but also to get some feedback and/or suggestions (or even offers of assistance, if you're enthusiastic about the idea).