Welcome to our Summer Newsletter!

We’ve been busy! Here’s some highlights:

• Understanding Children's Aggressive Behavior at School
• Using Greek Myths to Learn About Peace Literacy & Tech
• Building the Peace Literacy Metaverse

Understanding Children's Aggressive Behavior at School

We’ve just had an essay published in MontessoriPublic on how to use Peace Literacy to address aggressive behavior in the classroom. PLI Curriculum Coordinator Sharyn Clough and Executive Director Paul K. Chappell have been collaborating on this project with Jacqui Miller and Natalie Celeste, two members of the Peace Literacy curricular team who are dedicated to combining Peace Literacy with the teachings of Maria Montessori, in their work for urban schools in the Cleveland Metropolitan School District. Learn more here.

“A great social mission that will ensure the child justice, harmony, and love remains to be accomplished. And this great task must be the work of education, for this is the only way to bring a new world and to bring peace.”

– Maria Montessori

Using Greek Myths to Learn About Peace Literacy and Technology

Our technology has advanced in a way that gives humanity “god-like” powers which will irrevocably change who we are as a species. In this recently completed and beautifully illustrated online series, and discussion guide, we help students of all ages understand the true meaning of Nemesis (pictured above), the Greek goddess who serves as the Messenger of Justice and Dispenser of Dues. We use Nemesis to show the need to increase Peace Literacy, to pay our dues, in the face of five critical areas of technological advancement, represented here by Greek deities:

1. The Lightning Bolt of Zeus, a metaphor for electricity and the broadcast and digital technologies it makes possible
2. The Dream Worlds of Hypnos, a metaphor for virtual reality and augmented reality
3. The Robots of Hephaestus, a metaphor for artificial intelligence and robotics
4. The Life-Shaping Hands of Prometheus, a metaphor for genetic engineering
5. The Solar Fire of Helios, a metaphor for nuclear weapons. 

This set of lessons has already been piloted by one of our curriculum developers Stephanie Clapes for middle school students in New York. Clapes reports that the students are engaged and compelled by the material. peaceliteracy.org/peaceandtech

Building the Peace Literacy Metaverse

In a new video, Chappell offers a sneak peek at our Peace Literacy Virtual Reality (VR) Metaverse that transforms the classroom into an epic journey, taking students on a field trip into the human condition. After experiencing our first Peace Literacy journey to the Island of Aggression in VR, Corvallis High School Assistant Principal Colleen Works had this to say:

The power of VR in education is that it facilitates a whole body experience. … It offers multiple modalities to teach with, and even the student with learning challenges - attention issues, anxiety, reading/writing struggles - can be fully engaged in the learning. It inspires imagination, curiosity, and exploration, dispositions essential to learning. Students will remember this experience and therefore remember the content of the lesson.

You can find more about Leveraging New Technology on our homepage.

Thank you for your support of the Peace Literacy Institute as we work with you to build a world where students are as well-trained in waging peace as soldiers are in waging war.