Ages 14 and up Try catching some waves in world history. Navigate the expansion and interaction of flora, fauna, and peoples on the planet to this day.  An ability to analyze cultures and events is essential to productive communication between locales in the world economy during any age in the world's history.  

I. Envisioning the globe from various perspectives and disciplines is the first step to effective world historical analysis!

A. Here is an ice-breaker starter lesson for getting students to be aware of how they and their classmates have come to envision the world.

B. If you have a two year world history plan, here's an example of an exchange project to compare how generational differences in local, regional and global perspectives between cultures.

II. Perspectives from disciplines like Astronomy, Paleontology, and Anthropology are very useful analytic lenses for your world history bag; but they are not be as versatile as the good old creation story!

A. Here's a classic comparative scientific perspective piece from an early edition of Kevin Reilly's World of History. (This is a good follow-up assignment to the initial class world-view exercise.)

B. Creation stories are people's divinely inspired attempt to make deep sense of the world around them, the stories often reflect social values in the context of the local ecology. There are many clues that students enjoy discussing after their enactment of the story for the class. Here is a lesson plan that includes the stories students used and transcriptions of student comments.

Teacher Workshop archives to keep a handle on teaching world history

I. World historical analysis offers a transnational approach to many themes and issues -- As a teacher, "What does world history do for you and your class?"

A. Tom Mounkhall, veteran New York State secondary school teacher and Professor at the State University of New York (SUNY), was one of the first instructors for a two week AP World History teachers' workshop during the inaugural summer of 2000. Check out the buzz on the first day of the workshop!

B. "Big History" is the world historian's answer to the Creationism/Evolutionism controversy. Using Big History in the classroom, however, is a challenge that you have to work at if you think good history-teaching is good story-telling! This discussion of the issues at my high school in 2001 includes a lesson plan and reading that we used that year for 9th graders in their "Pre-AP" World History/Honors Geography class!

II. What World History is; What it isn't; and, What potential it has as a field of research

A. Ross Dunn's article in Knowing Learning and Teaching History: National and International Perspectives is very useful in understanding what the "New World History" is and what it isn't. Take the one question pre-test and then read the article here.

GET a HANDLE on it! a. Pre-test/Intro with Ross Dunn (30 min) b. Bentley Presentation/Discuss (1 hr) c. Post test bkmarked - transcript (30 min)

III. Changing the scale and scope of analysis brings into focus different patterns of historical meaning; and, thus, different chronologies

ROUND the WORLD in fifty minutes! a. Preface and introduction to lect (5 m) b. Manning presentation, discussion, test c. Neolithic artifacts read/resps (2 hr)

VI. Try situating Africa in World History -- it is not as easy as it may seem!

Africa is HUGE! b. Prof. Miller's 2006 AP Wld Hst presnt. a. Professor Adebayo presents to teachers a. Meeting of "Africanists" at Ft. Collins 2007

Projects for veteran teachers and students:"Teaching Globally, Learning Locally: Models and Resources for the Study of World History in Any Locality:" undergraduate student projects directed by Marc Jason Gilbert at North Georgia College and State University 2000/2001