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Feature: Teaching about peace - Educators help kids see value of global citizenship |
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About this issue
Alarming daily news reports about growing nuclear possibilities prevents anyone from singing — let alone harmonizing — rounds of “Give Peace a Chance.” The recent documentary, The US vs. John Lennon, reminds us of what youth can do to try and change the world.
Every conscious adult I talk to is profoundly struck by the frightening condition of our progressively fragile post 9/11 world. Our November education issue feature, “Teaching about peace,” by Michelle Feder states that “today there are more than 30 wars under way — about double the number that were being waged 50 years ago.” The statistic is shocking. Near and far there are a number of “evil genies” out of the bottle that rule the people and land they live on.
“Teaching about peace” will hopefully move all of us to take action within our families and beyond. We celebrate many local programs and lesser-known heroes whose values exemplify the best of the human spirit. They know their work of teaching compassion, peace and respect is urgent right now. Maybe we as individuals can eventually put the “evil genies” back in the bottle (vote on Nov 7th — please!) but in the meantime we need to focus on ways to teach peace and compassion to our children.
And, back to the battle at home. There was no peace with my 5-year-old and her equally spirited girlfriend when I decided to take them on a lovely fall ferry ride to Bainbridge on a much needed day off. Nearly driven to tears (me, not the five-year-olds) by the minute-by-minute negotiations required to keep the two girls from going overboard (emotionally and literally), I was baffled. I had never seen these two little girls in this state of being. I was consoled by reading the Getting School Ready column, “Ways to help kids survive social dilemmas,” by Linda Morgan (page 62). I forgot that “by grade school, those treasured days of social equanimity are pretty much over. ‘Let’s play blocks together’ morphs into elaborate exercises in negotiation.”
Happy Thanksgiving . . . and all we are saying is give peace a chance.
—Alayne Sulkin, publisher/editor