«Who still has an Australia?»

In sixth grade, the topic of Europe is on the curriculum, but this year - inspired by a project by Waldorf teacher Sven Saar – I decided to take a different approach to geography: starting with the whole, looking at the entire Earth and making it tangible with our hands. For sixth graders who, like all of us, live with globalization and its consequences on a daily basis, this seemed to me to be a sensible approach. My students' interest in environmental issues in particular was also picked up on and the charm of this approach became more and more apparent as we did it: «We're still finishing off the Rocky Mountains,» I heard when we were supposed to clean up. «I still need a big Asia Minor», another call rang out through the class. Anyone who has sculpted the Andes themselves with paper-mâché will probably not forget where they are, so the hope goes. And how huge Africa is, how infinitely far the Pacific is, how small our Europe is in comparison – atlases often don't give a true picture.

The subjects of geography, natural history and environmental education were easily brought together here. And German was also taught through individual project diaries. We all learned a lot. One of the major challenges was to place the grid of degrees on the large globe, and this required teamwork: holding the globe, measuring with a tape measure and understanding the two different sections for the meridians of longitude and the lines of latitude. All of this was achieved in small groups in which the globes were created. How do I even find the South Pole if I use the rubber nipple of the balloon as the North Pole? Fortunately, we had the large school globe to look at and to trace the templates we needed for the continents. It was also amazing to see how the poles are actually designed, as they always somehow disappear in the margins of the atlas... Some of the children became very ambitious to draw the land masses and ice deserts as accurately as possible.

The «normal» lessons were received kindly: We heard about the different European countries, highlighted the polarities of North and South and East and West, and yet we knew that we were only dealing with a tiny section of the world. Presentations and posters were therefore also allowed to be designed for all the other interesting countries in the world.

The work on the globe and its creation was particularly motivating. This is where all the joy and creative power unfolded. Even when the continents were drawn in, I, as a teacher, could see satisfied faces. But then came the magical moment when the colors appeared: when the busy buzz in the classroom became reverent and awe-inspiring because the earth could be experienced directly as a living organism. The children proudly and happily embraced their globes. And what also became clear: we all live here together on our beautiful earth. Let's preserve and protect it, we only have one.