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To teach students to be Changemakers, they must be exposed to them, often. After overhearing a rare conversation in Arabic here in Hiroshima, I did what all good global citizens and travelers would: offered them peace. Asalaamu alaikum (peace be with you), I said. Wa alaikum salaam (peace be unto you) They responded. Due to my lack of true Arabic skill, this quickly turned into an English conversation that revealed...

The economics and e-commerce module set out to understand the new age of Indian economics. Over the past five weeks students have learned and experienced the entire economic spectrum of India, from rural to urban and from low-tech to high tech. The student experience mirrored India’s economic transformation from spinning wheel to fiber-optic cable. This past week students did a deep dive into the world of high tech India in...

It is really difficult to describe how our time in Scotland has affected me. The sheer size and beauty of the Highland’s hills left me not only in awe, but it was also a very humbling experience. I believe that the things I experienced here have shown me that we all are part of a bigger whole, and that we should never forget that we have a role to play...

(Editor's Note: The full TGS Symposium can be viewed at the bottom of the post) The first annual TGS Symposium was held in Athens at the end of our 2014/2015 school year. The theme, Legends to Legacies, was chosen as a way to showcase exemplary student work crafted during our time in Greece. As a humanities team, we decided it was important to discuss the progression of thought, starting from...

In part one of this blog, I discussed the application of the “competition, not collaboration” concept to my Global Studies and Global Issues classes at THINK Global School. Part two will identify how I have begun to apply it more effectively to my own teaching and professional life. It is not by muscle, speed, or physical dexterity that great things are achieved, but by reflection, force of character, and judgment.Marcus...

Students helping Honduras At the beginning of my March 2015 trip to Honduras, I had a chance to sit through Shin Fujiyama’s opening speech to an incoming group of student volunteers from Clemson, Stony Brook, University of Maryland, and University of Maryland, Baltimore County. I’ve heard versions of this talk several times before when I’ve brought groups of high school students down to volunteer at Villa Soleada and El Progreso....

As the first term of our 2014-15 school year recently wound to a close in New Zealand, I looked through the student survey responses for my course and remembered one of my opening statements to the ninth and tenth grade students: “We run an educational model that is complicated but impressively different than most schools around the world. In order to set the foundation for optimal learning at our unique...

Our first class sessions of the 2014-15 school year involved a basic overview of what my goals for the course were, and I quickly shared my vision that the grade ten students create meaningful and engaging projects that deal with our local and global community. We started by discussing mission statements and worked for two entire class periods, finally coming together in agreement that: “By reaching out to the local...

To kick off our THINK Global School semester in Auckland, New Zealand, I wanted to create a unit that completely revolved around the incredible geography of our host country. Utilizing the THINK Global School Lens of Environment and Exploration*, my ninth grade global studies students challenged themselves to understand basic tenets of human geography. We began the unit with a Prezi on Maps and Map Skills. This Prezi, which can...

Influenced by a past project at THINK Global School, I decided to write a “Where I’m From” poem about Rikuzentakata, Japan. I was honored to lead a documentary team of ninth and tenth grade students to the northern Tōhoku region to investigate the post-tsunami rebuilding efforts. On our final day I had the time to sit and collate the stories we had heard and experiences that were shared with us....