“The World Peace Game is about learning to live and work comfortably in the unknown.”
Hunter, John. World Peace and Other 4th-Grade Achievements. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013.
The World Peace Game is played by students representing the leadership cabinets of four nations and four international organizations in the game space, negotiating and making decisions about the diplomatic, military, financial, business, and natural resources of the nations to solve an initial set of 24 crisis situations.
"Knowledge, creativity, and wisdom: that’s what I try to foster in my students. I want to teach them what I believe is the ultimate point of education and everything else, which is simply to express compassion in the world.
We can be smart and know how to fix things, and we can be wise and know how not to fall into holes, but what is the point of living if not to express the higher and deeper emotions? Why are we here if not to express compassion—and then to build the structures and relationships that allow the most and the deepest and the wisest compassion to be expressed?"
--John Hunter, World Peace and Other 4th Grade Achievements, p. 5.
"The World Peace Game is the story of individuals confronted by overwhelming and chaotic circumstances. First they must learn to face the reality of the moment. Then they must grasp that moment’s deeper implications and interconnections.
Finally, they have the chance to organize themselves into a new entity: a collaboration, a collective, a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts. This new collective can devise solutions far beyond the ability of any individual. We have the opportunity to be wiser, more creative, and more farseeing than any one person could ever be. Within this collective, individual members can tap into their deepest strengths, to become their best selves."
--John Hunter, World Peace and Other 4th Grade Achievements, p.10.
"What I ultimately wish for my students—and for myself—is precisely that type of observation without judgment: to be able to hold different perspectives simultaneously in their minds—to view a situation from all angles—and then to decide, without judgment, what is called for."
--John Hunter, World Peace and Other 4th Grade Achievements, p.126.