What is the root cause of our world’s troubles?
If you ask me, it’s not a trade imbalance or a terrorist threat. If we’re talking about the problem that lies at the heart of everything, it’s got to be a severe, devastating lack of empathy – the ability to understand and share the feelings of another. Continue reading “Open Ended Social Studies has the chapters that your world history textbook is missing”
When you’re teaching from many textbooks, it’s easy to think of native societies as “the other” – the Aztec are conquered and swept aside, if they’re mentioned at all, and they appear from the perspective of their conquerors. They didn’t even call themselves the Aztec, for that matter – they referred to themselves as the Mexica, a name lent to the modern nation, and often excluded from your textbooks to prevent confusion between the two among students. Continue reading “For educators: Create an illustrated glossary of Nahuatl/English loan words”
Some of these girls are refugees from Syria and Iraq. Now, through the mercy and compassion of others, they are safe, fortunate enough to attend school in Bahrain. But there are many more just like them still hoping to escape the conflict and war that continues unabated in their homeland.
If only the United States – self-proclaimed greatest nation on Earth – could hold itself to the same standard as Bahrain.
The President of the United States – acting from fear, ignorance, and prejudice, in defiance of the America’s best virtues, of tolerance, inclusion, and mercy – has unilaterally decided that Islam is the enemy.
Our new Open Ended Social Studies video has gone live. Use it in your classroom to supplement your lessons on Islam. Kick start a conversation about salat and the Five Pillars. Answer the question: What happens in a mosque?
Continue reading “New Mini-Documentary: What Happens in a Mosque?”
Who was Muhammad, and how did the Arab world of the seventh century shape his teachings? Continue reading “Muhammad, the Prophet of Islam”
Until relatively recently, it was widely believed that the Amazon Rainforest was incapable of sustaining large scale human development. New findings have challenged this view, and evidence of ancient agriculture suggests that humans once developed this fragile region in ways so subtle that – in the form of carefully managed soils and prehistoric orchards – they have been hiding in plain sight all this time, challenging the basic tenants of “agriculture” as western eyes tend to recognize it. Continue reading “Unrecognized Potential: Terra Preta, Ancient Orchards, and Life in the Amazon”
Globalization is nothing new – the indigenous peoples slaving away in the Potosi mines 500 years ago could tell you all about it, while Europeans cracked the whip in order to buy Asian-made goods at affordable prices. Add in the fact that the mines were supplied with food and coca by African slaves laboring away in the low lands, and you have a template for the modern integrated global economy – exploitation, unequal rewards, and all. Continue reading “Potosi and the Globalization of an Empire”
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