If the World Were a Village

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It is much easier to grasp the idea of walking through a village of one hundred and seeing over half of your neighbors hungry than to try to imagine millions of hungry people in places many children have never even heard of. If you are being simultaneously translated, speaking too rapidly also makes it more difficult for the translator. It is important to be thoughtful about how the data are presented because sometimes key messages can be missed out because of the way the data are shown.

Written by David J Smith, If The World is a Village paints a picture of the world population as just a village of 100 people.The focus on environmental and other issues such as poor air quality, lack of clean water, and the challenges of girls receiving an education encourages action. Now imagine if the world of over 6 billion people were shrunk down to the size of a small village of 100 people. Particularly when talking about expert matters, the people in the room may very well understand your ‘technical’ language. In Social Studies, this book could be used in conjunction with mapping activities and social issues discussions. For instance, in the global village 22 people speak a Chinese dialect, nine speak English, and three Portuguese.

Some of the pages in the book are easier to interpret and represent than others, so there's some natural differentiation. At the same time, the book does make it easy for its readers as it takes all the global statistics with big numbers (millions/billions), and puts them in real human terms. We didn't receive it from our library until now, but we were glad to finally get a chance to read it. Parts of the book are a bit dark, but, that's how the world is and it doesn't make too much sense to hide the disparity in circumstances from children. Access to Electricity In our global village… 76 people have electricity 24 people do not Of the 76 people who have electricity most use it only for light at night Some villagers have luxuries that depend on electricity.trillion aquatic animals are killed for food, bycatch such as turtles and dolphins biggest threat to life as a species is the fishing industry trawlers, netting, and being caught as by-catch. I was fortunate enough to grow-up in a fairly affluent part of California and I still remember the first time we took a trip to the mid-west. And the photographs further engage us: when we see photos of the tiny rooms, the beds doubling as sofas, the squalid toilets, the dark hallways – and most of all people’s faces – we can much more easily imagine what it was like to live there in that time. This book scales down this abstract idea for children in a way that can help them understand the diversity of our population. Compared to a book such as One World, One Day that focuses more on the everyday experiences of children around the world and the similarities despite differences.

People’s religions are explored, and their education, standard of living and much, much more are discovered.He has also written five other books -- "If The World Were A Village", which was published in March, 2002, by Kids Can Press in Toronto, and "The CEESA Web-Site Manual" and "Emergency Procedures Handbook for International Schools" were published respectively in 1998 and 2003 by the US State Department. Thought-provoking and highly effective, this world-in-miniature will open eyes to a wider view of our planet and its human inhabitants.