Amazing, Cross-Curricular Resource!
Community Review for Global Oneness Project
My Take
Geographer, Alexander B. Murphy says in his book Geography: Why it Matters, “Knowing about something is a prerequisite to caring about it.” Global Oneness Project resources help teachers and ultimately students better understand our world and our place in it. If nothing else, more teachers and students who know something about the world’s rich diversity of peoples and communities and about the current crisis facing our planet might mean a populous who cares about and ultimately acts upon a better tomorrow.
This is a meaningful resource for any Social Science, Science, or ELA course and I am sure applicable to many others as well.
How I Use It
Geography is a complex and often misunderstood discipline. Students come in to the course with limited exposure to thinking geographically and often with limited knowledge about the world in general. Being able to capitalize on the multitude of “stories” told via the Global Oneness Project helps teachers build content and pedagogical tools to further students understanding of the following:
• Looking beyond the local to explain various human phenomenon and helping students recognize that things are as they are because of a multitude of factors (not just local, but global as well)
• Students perceptions of the world are as they are for a reason. Exposing students to individual and community stories beyond what they already know helps them broaden their understanding of the world and helps in breaking down misunderstandings and assumptions they have learned from mainstream media.
• Geography seeks to help students understand how physical and human systems interact and how humans are impacting our planet. It is one thing for students to read an academic article about how this might be happening and quite another for them to see and witness how places and landscapes change due to human-environment interaction and how different communities are impacted by that change. This connects students to the humanist side of human geography and ultimately helps instill a desire to keep learning and hopefully a desire to act in concert with sustainable development.
• In order for students to understand the unique characteristics of a given place or space, they must be able to think about how a variety of systems (political, economic, cultural, physical) mix. The Global Oneness Project provides students with the necessary lenses to understand the complexity of local and global issues and problems.
• At the heart of geography is creating a more informed, engaged global citizen who can question, critique, and ultimately know something about local and global issues. The GOP resources help students answer questions, but also ask more questions that serve to inspire a deeper-dive into issues important for our subject and important for better understanding our dynamic world.