Everyone has a worldview. What helps students understand this? According to teachers at Christian Academy in Japan, what helps their students includes:

1. Connecting course content and life
   
2. Questions
   
3. Literature
   
4. Discussion/debate
   
5. Clarifying what a worldview is
   
6. Experiential learning

Real question: The real question isn’t “What helps your students understand that everyone has a worldview?" The real question is “How will you help your students today understand that everyone has a worldview?”

Take action. Today.

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Here are the responses of teachers at Christian Academy in Japan:

(1) Connecting course content and life:

• Math seems a little cut-and-dried, but it's possible to examine mathematical assumptions to see where they begin, or on what basis they are made…. I think starting with topics or characters that touch students' lives is a good place to begin, and then moving from there to more complex connections and implications.
  
• Exposing students to things that seem nonsensical to them and then helping them come to understand those things by understanding a new worldview helps students to understand that everyone has a worldview. For example, in my Bible 9 unit on Hinduism, students choose a news article from the BBC related to Hinduism and explain how the things we have learned in class help them make sense of the event. One student selected a story about a man who married his dog. He did this to try to create good karma after being cruel to several other dogs. What we had learned about the Hindu worldview helped the student understand this bizarre event.
  
• For one project, I have them look at a social issue and then relate it to math. I can see them putting together ideas from their beliefs (I ask them for their Bible references) as well as what they have learned from their project in their conclusion. In this project and in others (i.e., Planet Project in 6th grade), we apply math to real life situations, which in turn will affect their worldview. Often applying math can change the way they look at an issue or a topic.

(2) Questions:

• Questions about issues…challenge my students to think about their own worldviews….
  
• My students are the elementary teachers…. Helping them to understand they have a “view” on the classroom environment could look like this: I could ask them: What does the ideal classroom look like? Make a list. Which items on your list are based on your assumptions and your beliefs?

(3) Literature:

• Studying literature…helps my students see more of what a worldview is and means.
  
• This week we will be reading Where’s the Big Bad Wolf? by Eileen Christelow….. We will be reading and discussing the motivation and misunderstanding of actions…in regards to various versions of the Three Little Pigs.
  
• The 10th grade literature book has 2 companion pieces showing 2 different views of the same event—reaching Everest’s peak—one by Edmund Hillary and the other by Tenzig Norgay…. Not only does Hillary’s focus on facts and Norgay’s on the emotion of the experience, but also there are flat out factual discrepancies: Hillary’s account sounds like he pulled Norgay up, and Norgay’s sounds like they were equal partners. In the future, I want to not just make the point that all writing has bias, but why—all people have a worldview.

(4) Discussion/debate:

• Showing students artwork from various time periods and various countries and cultures clearly can show various worldviews…. Discussion of worldviews represented in the art can help students understand that everyone has a worldview.
  
• In Bible, we assume one worldview. The OT is full of idols and asherah poles and pagan kings. What was their worldview? I don’t think I’ve ever thought about it before. We should talk in class about the worldview of the pagan kings. And we should talk about what it is in the Israelites worldview that causes them to be disobedient to God so often.
  
• …ethical choices/issues, case studies, and environmental studies.

(5) Clarifying what a worldview is: It is important to help students clearly understand what a worldview consists of—defining what makes up such a worldview will help to diminish confusion.

(6) Experiential learning: Experience helps. I’ve tried out various activities, getting students into other shoes. I wonder what would happen if we took this literally? Switch shoes, swap iPods, change grades or essays? I might actually try this—what would it literally look like to embrace the customs of another, to get a glimpse of his worldview?