February 2008 Archives

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             Photo by Chang W. Lee, courtesy of NYTimes.com.

They aren't state officials, tourists, or even professional athletes. No, the largest group of Americans to set foot on North Korean soil since the Korean War is the New York Philharmonic Orchestra (NYTimes.com).

The orchestra played a repertoire of music including the North Korean and American National Anthems, classical pieces by Wagner and Dvorak, and "Arirang" a traditional folk song profoundly significant to both North and South Koreans. The program was scrupulously selected to serve as a musical expression of goodwill toward the North Korean audience. Is it appropriate to characterize the concert as "symphonic diplomacy?" New York Times journalist Daniel J. Wakin explored this contention in an article in the newspaper's online edition.

Song Sok-hwan, North Korea's vice-minister of culture seemed to suggest as much by describing the event as "an important occasion to open a chapter of mutual understanding between the two countries." Lorin Maazel, the Music Director for the New York Philharmonic, offered a somewhat more reserved statement, "If it does come to be seen in retrospect as a historical moment, we will all be very proud."

As Wakin pointed out, this is not the first time that an American cultural institution like the Philharmonic has embarked on such a seemingly audacious mission of ambassadorship. The Boston Symphony orchestra paid a visit to the Soviet Union shortly after the onset of the Cold War in 1956, and the Philadelphia orchestra traveled to China despite tenuous U.S.-China relations in 1973.

Despite involvement of state department envoys in planning the Philharmonic's trip to North Korea, U.S. government officials were cautious not to overstate its significance. White House Press Secretary Dana Perino emphasized that, "At the end of the day, we consider this concert to be a concert, and it's not a diplomatic coup."

Regardless of whether the concert was explicitly intended to pacify underlying tensions between the two nations, the evocative, transformational power of music knows no boundaries--it transcends political geography. While diplomats may mull over logistics, security, and the potential implications of the visit, onlookers in the audience Tuesday night appeared to care little about such details. The concert demonstrates the connectedness and shared humanity of the international community--regardless of the political acts of state bodies. And it can't do any harm. Or can it?

Tell Us: What do you think about the New York Philharmonic's concert in North Korea as an act of diplomacy on behalf of the United States?

For more on the concert in Pyongyang, check out these articles:

Wall Street Journal Online

MSNBC.com

Sarah for My Wonderful World

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Image courtesy of EF Educational Tours.

The newest member of our Blogroll is "Following the Equator," the blog recently created for Education First (EF) Educational Tours. The blog currently features travel jottings from a student trip to
France. EF fosters global citizenship through programs for teacher and student travel abroad, an effort aligned with our mission to "give kids the power of global knowledge." Read more about the organization's work here.

Does the idea of educational travel sound appealing? There are still a few days left to enter EF's "Global Citizens" essay contest. Twelve winners will have the chance to participate in an expenses-paid, ten-day international trip.

Here's a bit more about the contest from the "Following the Equator" blog:

Do you know any outstanding global citizens? Do you know any high school sophomores or juniors who can write compelling essays? Do those students want to travel the world this summer?

Then nominate them for EF's Global Citizen Awards contest.

Each student must write an essay (not to exceed 1,500 words) on the following topic:

Describe how a shared experience with someone from another cultural background influenced both of you as global citizens.

All entries must be postmarked by February 28, 2008.

Good luck and happy trails!

Sarah for My Wonderful World

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Image courtesy of the National Geographic store.

In the January newsletter (join the campaign now to receive our monthly e-newsletter) we challenged readers to get an atlas and use it like a dictionary of the world.

Tell Us: What's the most surprising fact you learned from your atlas?

I learned that the newest country was Montenegro, which declared independence from Serbia in 2006. As of this week, however, that information is old, well, news. On Sunday, February 17, 2008 Kosovo followed suit and declared its own independence from Serbia to become the new, newest country. The Declaration remains hotly contested, with the world's powers divided in accepting the new nation. Look for an upcoming feature on the event and the raging debate.

Sarah for My Wonderful World

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Americans' alleged hostility to global knowledge continues to attract media attention following last week's NYTimes.com feature of Susan Jacoby's book, The Age of American Unreason. In a recent spot on the Today Show, Matt Lauer interviewed the author. Jacoby offered insight into the phenomena of anti-intellectualism and geographic illiteracy, again citing the National Geographic-Roper Poll.

An entertaining, yet disturbing, intro to the segment featured what Lauer characterized as "pop-culture lowlights." A compilation of clips from reality shows, late night TV programs, and You Tube videos depicted geographic and general knowledge "bloopers," all seeming to indicate that America is in fact "getting dumber." Jacoby echoed these sentiments. 

So what's to be done about the crisis in Americans' global knowledge? Jacoby places a majority of the blame on a culture of anti-intellectualism, an accusation with which I do not necessarily agree. More accurate, I think, is her critique of an educational system that fails to prepare students for success in a global society.

There exists a critical need to expand geographic education offerings in schools, and also at home and in the community. It is imperative that children receive a comprehensive, sophisticated, high-quality geographic education that both inspires them to care about the planet, its resources, and its inhabitants-- and teaches them HOW to do so. This information must be presented in an engaging, personally relevant format that encourages students to become lifelong learners and active global citizens as adults. It's a lofty goal, but one to which the My Wonderful World team, our 26 coalition partners, and our colleagues at National Geographic are firmly committed. So please visit mywonderfulworld.org today, and tell a friend to do the same. Join the campaign and become an activist in the quest to produce a globally knowledgeable, geographically literate U.S. population.

Tell Us: How important to you is global knowledge?

Sarah for My Wonderful World

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The New York Times online provoked a spirited debate yesterday with the question: Are American’s hostile to knowledge? Nearly 1000 weighed in on the comment board, which accompanied an article describing Susan Jacoby’s new book: The Age of American Unreason.

Jacoby decries what she describes as an American culture of widespread ignorance and anti-intellectualism, citing the alarming results of the 2006 National Geographic-Roper Survey of Geographic Literacy as evidence in support of her claim.

Here’s how a selection of contributors responded:

“Americans miss out on global knowledge due to their innate egocentrism. Institutions, as well as government, foster a sense that the world revolves around the USA and nothing else matters. Nonethless [sic], the rest of the world is taking advantage of the true effects of this "global village", sharing experiences and being more aware of both diversity and commonalities.”

“Is it perception or fact? And does it permeate throughout all sectors of US society. [sic] I believe that there are certain groups of people that have never bothered to know anything beyond the end of there noses and that is just fine with them. It speaks badly for them because their ignorance shows through, but worse than that gives an image about Americans to the outside world that says, “yes we’re dumb, but so what, we’re comfortable in our skin being that way.”

“There is a tradition of anti-intellectualism in the United States. Unfortunately, the fault lies partly with our educational philosophy. To this day, students are taught to memorize and regurgitate, rather than educated in skills and problem solving.”

These crises of geographic/global illiteracy and educational oversight are of fundamental concern to the My Wonderful World campaign, our international studies colleagues at the ISSA conference, environmental studies advocates, and many others in the educational arena and beyond.

Tell us: What do you think about Jacoby’s book and the comments posted on NYTimes.com? Are Americans hostile to knowledge, in general? And more specifically: Are Americans hostile to global knowledge?

I’ll offer my own perspective on this after the weekend.
Happy Presidents’ Day!

Sarah for My Wonderful World

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Image courtesy of www.du.edu/issa/.

It was windy, all right: The icy gusts tearing across Lake Michigan threatened to hijack my breath and use it for fuel on the short journey into the city. And I learned of the storied political 'hot-air' during excursions to Chicago's famous landmarks.

In addition to these blustery mainstays of the Midwestern Capital, there were some new winds of change stirring at a hotel in the small suburb of Itasca, Illinois this past weekend. At the 7th annual International Studies Schools Association conference, visionary educators, administrators, university researchers, non-profit organizations, and others met to share best practices and coordinate efforts to internationalize curricula and schools. My Wonderful World, along with National Geographic Education's Geography Action! program, participated as an exhibitor and presenter to the gathering of more than 300 attendants.

It was a truly inspirational event. Andy Revkin and Jimmie Briggs, both New York-based journalists, delivered keynote addresses on the climate crisis and the tragedy of child soldiers. Reformers, with titles like "Director of Global Studies," presented on a broad range of international education topics, from integration of technology and new media techniques to theoretical application to classroom praxis, with taglines like "social networking for global understanding;" "complexity, adaptive change, and globalizing education;" and "teaching about genocide."

As a campaign to "give kids the power of global knowledge," it was focus on the issues that got My Wonderful World most excited about the conference. Geography is, of course, a vital piece of any international studies curriculum, and even makes sense as an overarching contextual framework for such a curriculum. In many ways, "globalizing" the curriculum is synonymous with infusing geography and the geographic perspective into the teaching of traditional and new subject areas. The geographic lens enriches all subjects, including history, earth science, economics and civics. And all the other "globalize your school" initiatives, including international classroom connections, study abroad and exchanges programs, and foreign language instruction, are grounded within and complementary to a comprehensive geography curriculum.

We left the ISSA conference with a new set of like-minded friends, an affirmed sense of empowerment, and a reenergized dedication to our mission. If you met us at the conference, please drop us a line and tell us about your favorite parts of the event. Also, look for me to feature some of the programs I encountered on upcoming installments of the blog!

Sarah for My Wonderful World

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Image courtesy of The CommonCensus Sports Map Project

On Sunday night I watched with chagrin as my beloved New England Patriots football team forfeited all hope of a perfect, Cinderella season with a loss to the New York Giants in Super Bowl XLII. Perhaps the pain of envisioning Eli Manning celebrating on his way to Disney World would have been slightly less abrasive had there been a few fellow Bostonians to commiserate. Unfortunately, I was surrounded by a room full of native New Yorkers, Long Islanders, and New Jerseyites.

This fateful scenario got me thinking about the geography of sports teams fan affiliations. While the love of sport may be universal, team loyalties are decidedly regional--in most cases, that is. Of course, you have the émigrés, those of us who have relocated, whether temporarily or permanently, to a new region of the country but maintain our hometown spirit. For instance, it's no surprise that in a Washington, D.C. apartment of recent college graduates there'd be a healthy smattering of Northeast sports fans.

Then, there are those magical teams whose appeal somehow transcends traditional regional boundaries and manages to captivate a broader audience. My friend from Trinidad and Tobago is a diehard supporter of the Manchester United soccer club in England, arguably the most popular team in the world. It's amazing to me how strong sports loyalties are. You'll often hear terms like "nation" (as in "Red Sox Nation") used to describe fans as a very real parallel to citizens of a unified state. And just like a state, loyalties are defined by a combination of geographic, political, and cultural boundaries. Now that is worth scrutinizing through a geographic lens.

Here's a website to get you started thinking geographically about sports: CommonCensus.org is a project to effectively conduct a census of sports fans across the U.S. They don't, however, endeavor to provide explanations for the patterns. That task, I suppose, will be left up to us as geographers!
Tell Us: Where is your hometown, and who are your favorite sports teams?

Sarah for My Wonderful World

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Image courtesy of Reach the World

 
Reach the World, a New York-based educational non-profit recently released "GeoGames," a series of free, interactive online activities that adopt a hands-on approach to learning geography. Supported by findings from educational research, GeoGames is distinct from other online games in its use of a 3D globe rather than the traditional 2D map. Keeping with the organization's mission to "help elementary and secondary school students and teachers to develop the knowledge, attitudes, values and thinking skills needed for responsible citizenship in a complex, culturally diverse and rapidly changing world," GeoGames gives kids a more realistic understanding of spatial relationships on our spherical planet.

The website features two games produced in partnership with the National Geographic Education Foundation and Dangerous Media. "Build Planet Earth" challenges players to place major geographic features in their correct locations on a blank globe. Similarly, "Map Countries and Cities" tests knowledge of human geography by enlisting players to locate countries and capitals. Don't worry if your map skills aren't what you wish they were--you can select among three levels of difficulty and learn as you go!

Another unique aspect of GeoGames is a personalization feature that enables one to add a title and description to each map. Time score is also included, which helps to track individual improvement. I got 52 seconds on "Build The Earth" and 1:49 minutes on "Map Countries and Cities." Tell us how you did!

These games are great for people of all ages, especially kids. It is essential that children understand early in their education how the world really looks, which the 3D globe does beautifully.

For other geographic games and quizzes, check out these links:

Maps.com: The world's largest map store has a wide selection of games and quizzes. From games that help alien invaders find their Earthy destinations, to quizzes that test your knowledge of world history and geography. It has something for all levels.

National Geographic Kids: Specializing in education and entertainment for kids, National Geographic Kids' game GeoSpy is a "Carmen Sandiego"-like quiz for kids to help them expand their geographic knowledge.

I like 2 Learn: This website is full of physical geographic quizzes that range from very easy to very difficult.

Marie for My Wonderful World

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