We got the opportunity to watch the TED Talk on "World Peace & Other Fourth Grade Achievements."
This talk was presented by John Hunter who has created the World Peace game for his students. Through this game his students must think and reflect on many problems of the world. As well they develop compassion and acceptance for everyday tragedies and triumphs such as war, disease, natural resource discovery, and much more.
Hunter not only proposes an interesting way to get a classroom immersed in learning, but the World Peace Game is extremely self propelled. Reflecting back on my own learning, the years that teachers got us involved in our education are more easy to recall. I remember the rock unit in grade three because we polished our own rocks. I remember the Political unit in grade six because we had to run our own election, equipped with promotional buttons, posters and speeches.
Naturally not everyone is going to agree with me that self learning is the best. It is more so a priviledge which even through my own education students would abuse the opportunity with minimum performance; however some people learn better when it's hands on. Sitting in a desk listening to a lecture often gets boring and it's nice to have an activity to break the lecture up. I think a variation of group and self learning is necessary in a classroom.
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