 Hi Lilian, welcome. Hi, how are you? We just did a couple of minutes. Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening everyone who's joining in. We're just going to give it a couple of minutes so that others can join in and then we will begin straight away. All right, we're two minutes past the hour, so I think we should begin and we'll welcome other participants as they keep joining. So thank you everyone for joining us today. We are delighted as Mission 4.7 to present to you this session on chatting with teachers. And we wanted to do this because this is really where the, you know, when we talk about sustainable development and education for sustainable development, the real action is in the classrooms. And so this is our attempt to get the classrooms into ICSD. And we hope that this will be an enjoyable session for you. I'm Chandrika Bahadur. I'm the director of the STJ Academy and chair of the Mission 4.7 Secretariat. And I'm joined here by my co-host, Julia Zimmerman, who will introduce herself right now. Julia, over to you. Thank you so much, Chandrika. My name is Julia Zimmerman and I'm a program officer at the Ban Ki Moon Center for Global Citizens, a quasi international organization based in Vienna, Austria. We're also very proud to be members of the Mission 4.7 Secretariat and to have our co-chair Ban Ki Moon as one of the patrons of Mission 4.7. It's very exciting to join you all today and to hear about all of your on-the-ground expertise teaching 4.7. Back to you, Chandrika. Thanks, Julia. I thought we'd begin with just a very quick introduction of our panel. We're really delighted to have a stellar group of teachers with us. I'm going to start in alphabetical order. So let's begin, George, with you. George Delacruz is both a licensed nurse and a teacher. He's been in the teaching business for 18 years now. And as a nurse as well, he served as clinical instructor and preceptor for 12 years and served as two-time faculty president of the SDI West-Nobro's University College of Nursing. He's also been faculty vice president at Central Philippine State University and Handuvan National High School. And he sits as a board representative for the Balaford City Public High School Federation. He's also a teacher and has received many awards, including most outstanding teacher, District 4 Division of Vocaloid City. George, welcome so much to the event. Yes, welcome. We are also delighted to have with us Javiera Rana, who is an ESL tutor with 10 years of experience in developing lesson plans and curriculum for all students and accomplished ESL students in Pakistan and around the world. She has a master's degree in TESOL and an M-Phil in ELT and is a trained licensed Cambridge trainer. She's worked with top schools in Pakistan such as Beacon House, the City School and Chand Park School. She's also a STEM ED Fellow of the Jumki Basu Foundation in New York, a National Geographic Certified Educator, a Scientist Ambassador, a WLF Ambassador and an Advocate for the Global Schools Program. Welcome, Javiera. Thank you so much, Chandrika. Thank you so much for this great introduction. Thank you. We're also delighted to welcome Lillian Olu from Kenya. Lillian is an early years educator at Setum Schools, and she is also an alumnus of the SDG Academy in Education for Sustainable Development course, and she is the president of the Kenya National Committee of the World Organization for Early Childhood Education, OMEP. In 2017, Lillian received commendation for special achievement in ESD from World OMEP, and in 2016, she actually was part of a travel award to South Korea, where her contribution led to OMEP's contribution to the UNESCO Global Action Plan. She's the founder of the Toy Library Association of Kenya and a board member of the International Toy Library Association as the Africa Link. Lillian, we're so delighted that you could join us. Thank you. And our final teacher is Santha Nair, who's an English teacher at a vernacular school in Perak, Malaysia. She's formerly the head of the English department and currently holds the position of head of the arts department. She's a master trainer for the lower Perak District for the separate aligned English language curriculum and has not only graduated in a bachelor's of teaching, but is currently doing her MBA in Sustainable Development Management. What a wonderful combination. She is an alumnus of the Young Southeast Asian Leadership Initiative, and she attended their academy in 2016. Santha, thank you so much for joining us. It's a pleasure to have you with us. Thank you. All right. So that's our wonderful panel, a great amount of experience amongst all of you in different fields of education. So we're really looking forward to hearing from you. I thought what we'd do as a start is, Julia and I will just give a little bit of an overview of Mission 4.7, which is the underlying framework which brings us all together. And then we'll really dive in. So just for everybody listening in and for all of you, Mission 4.7 is an initiative that was launched last year in December 2020 at the Vatican in the presence of the Pope. It is essentially a mobilization and an advocacy effort to bring together leaders from around the world to push for achievement of SDG target 4.7, which as all of you know, is the particular target in the Sustainable Development Goals target and indicator framework that focuses on the need to educate our young people about sustainable development, about global, to help them become global citizens, to teach them about culture, peace, non-violence. And essentially it's a really powerful target that for us emphasized everything that the SDG stand for. And that is really why Mission 4.7 was launched to elevate target 4.7 and to help mobilize governments as better school systems to actually adopting this target and making it happen in their classrooms. So that's 4.7. We have two patrons. We're very honored to have former Secretary General Ban Ki-moon as a patron of 4.7. And we're also honored to have the Director General of UNESCO, Ms. Audre Ozilay as the other patron of 4.7. The initiative has four co-chairs, Professor Jeffrey Sats, who's the president of the Sustainable Development Solutions Network, Ms. Stefiana Giannini, who is the assistant director general in charge of education at UNESCO, Marcello Sorondo, who is the president of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, and Tanshi Jeffrey Chia, who is the president of Sunway University in Malaysia. So we have a really wonderful spread out set of leaders leading this initiative, representing different aspects of multilateral organizations, academia, nonprofit. And with them, we have mobilized a high-level advisory group, as well as an education task force, comprising both leaders in the field, but also academics and technocrats who have spent large parts of their career focusing on how to actually make this happen. So that's the broad structure. We're a small secretary. This is a joint initiative of UNESCO, the Ban Ki-moon Center, the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, SDSN, as well as Sunway University. And so we are all banding together essentially to see how can we help you, teachers in the classrooms, promote these objectives. I'm going to turn it over to Julia to give a quick overview of the work that we do, and then we'll begin our discussion. Thank you, Chandrika. So this is a great overview of all of the different energy going into Mission 4.7 from so many different angles and ultimately to support teachers like you in the classroom that you feel supported by policy and by materials to really be able to implement 4.7 on the ground. So Mission 4.7 has three main objective areas. So one is the advocacy area, another is guidelines, and a third is monitoring. And in the year 2021-2022, the secretariat has been pushing along with its members of the high-level advisory group and the Education Task Force. Particularly, the second objective has been a big focus for us, which is the guidelines and principles. We're working currently, and it will actually be soft launching, tomorrow already, a guidelines and principles for transformative education, which will also become a platform that can be used by teachers or by policymakers, educators around the world to have a framework as well as a depository for resources on teaching SDG 4.7. So we really believe that this is going to be filling a necessary gap and something that many members of the secretariat of Mission 4.7 have been working very hard on. We also hope to have training modules this year for teachers, MOOCs, online training modules that really help make it more feasible to teach in the classroom to integrate into current curricula for teachers on the ground. And also localization toolkits, because we understand that it's really important that these principles are localized. It can't be a one cookie cutter, one size fits all situation. It has to really be localized and specified for given scenarios. In the advocacy work this year was the Berlin Declaration on Education for Sustainable Development, which I'm sure many of you have heard of, and Mission 4.7 has been very much championing this and working with UNESCO to promote the declaration. Furthermore, there will be additional activities at the COP coming up where we're hoping to bring together ministers of education and environment to make further commitments to climate education, but also education for sustainable development and global citizenship education. So both that ESD and GCE or GCED, depending on how you use the acronym, that those are really taught in schools. And lastly, in the monitoring, we're hoping to develop a policy tracker as well as an index using what already exists, of course, not reinventing the wheel, but trying to really, let's say, streamline, improve it that it's really utilized by policymakers, but also supportive then of the teachers all the way down to the grassroots level that this policy index exists. So that's about the work of Mission 4.7. We also are championing, of course, our members of the Education Task Force and the High Level Advisory Group and their work, which is quite vast already, so much is being done. And a lot of it just needs to be brought into the spotlight. So that's what we're hoping to do as Mission 4.7. And with that, enough about us. We want to hear from you. That's the point of this session. And I would like to start already with a question and maybe we'll turn it first to George for a response. And the question is, is describe through an example, how you're teaching sustainable development, SDGs, global citizenship education to your students? How are you doing it? We'd love to hear. George, over to you. Hi. Once again, good morning, everyone, or good afternoon, or whatever. I believe in Nelson Mandela's statement that education is the most powerful weapon that can change the world. Yeah, I agree to that. Having SDGs integrated in the lessons surely makes an impactful and meaningful effect to the entire educative processes. And what actually are the main roles of education in sustainable development? Its purpose is transformative in nature, in the sense that it should widen the world views, question and sustainability, and build competencies to address global challenges and be accommodated into global system. Beyond this education for sustainable development means integrating the future as a specific dimension of our learning activities and teaching. How to build a sustainable future must play a central role in education processes. So therefore, all teachers and educators from different learning communities around the world must take the leading order to achieve a more promising world for the future. Education for sustainable development seeks to equip learners with the knowledge, skills, and values and competencies that actually contribute to the healthy and just economically viable and ecological sustainable features for all. So to become more sustainable, we must recognize and respond appropriately to the complexity of interconnectedness of issues such as conflicts, poverty, wasteful consumption, environmental degradation, climate change, urban population growth, gender inequalities, and other human rights violations. So the problem is that a significant number of us are apathetic about this and other sustainability issues. So even in the face of overwhelming evidence that many of our actions are negatively impacting our society's economies and environment. So to foster sustainability, we need to rebalance individual and societal needs in once. So for me as a teacher, I always integrate SDGs, a thematic approach in my lessons, and through advocacy where I train my students case-based scenario, where they analyze issues and how their roles play. So I think that's challenging for us teachers and how to integrate SDGs, a thematic approach. Thank you so much, George. So really using case studies, I think as a way to make it very tangible for the students and hearing from you is really important for how you integrate. Great. Let's move on to Santa. Could you share a little bit about, in your experience, how you're implementing this in the classroom? Well, is it possible I can share a screen? I should love to show some pictures. Is that possible? Let's check with the technical team if you can allow sharing screen for Santa. Yeah, that should be no problem. You should be able to share right now. Thank you. Sure. Thank you so much. So just let me know if you can see. Okay. So basically, I have like, thank you so much, first of all, to know for this opportunity, speaking here for the first time at a big event. So it is amazing. So I use three main techniques to actually teach my children because my school is a primary school and kids really needed to be exposed to this kind of things. So what I used to do is I actually learned the curriculum first, learned the content. So even though I'm teaching English, I'm not only teaching the language skills, but I also learned the content, whether it is suitable or not to be degraded with the SDGs. The next part is I actually curate the lessons according to the content and the language skills. So what I've done here is like, if you can look creature close up games and then we had like, internal scientists and speakers coming in, like co-teach with us and to give this children exposure. Apart from that, I go out and have experiences like from different platforms, like from global schools, from YCLEE, from UNITE 2030. I learned how they actually teach adults in SDGs and I actually downsized the level and have a lot of post-it notes, design thinking sessions with the students. So if you can see here like safety design thinking patterns, those are actually part of the topics that we have in the English syllabus. What we do is we chunk it up and you know, put it in a bit size or like a diagram phase and talk about it. It enhances the speaking and listening skill as well. Like for example, like I have like food that I like, that is actually a year two, eight years old classroom where they actually talk about what fast food they love and you know, those vegetables or even fruits, those kind of topics. But and then I take them to a different scenario in the classroom speaking about is it easy for you to get food? You know, is it difficult for you to get resources like like apples or you know, vegetables for you to and I hear like a lot of children tell me that teacher I have like sometimes one meal per day and that is happening in a developing country like in Malaysia. So through the classroom I actually provide them exposures like this and we also talk about topics like the climate change. Like today I just finished speaking about the weather for eight years old classroom and you know, one student were asking me and teacher it's not snowing Malaysia. So what's happening in other countries if you know, we have snows. So basically, I create the exposure within the content using the language skills because my students are between from seven to 12 years old. So it's more of gamification, exposing them to like they love colors. So I use a lot of colors in my content and exposing them to like English language competitions which related to SDGs. So my previous school actually was top five of the actions on competition where we solely performed about the sustainable development goals. So if you can see that the box we actually created about the global goals that was like a one big thing because we couldn't find most of it. So it's actually in the classroom and out of the classroom. And even the SDGs are very new to the students. So I expose the teachers. So currently recently this year my team and I won actually a grant where we collaborated with 25 teachers to create environmental education playbook. Thank you to British High School Malaysia for providing that grant. We actually created lesson plans around these SDGs to actually help teachers and then for the students. The end product was all primary school students. So yeah, that's it. Thank you so much for these great examples, Santa. So the gamification of the SDGs and the topics related to the SDGs, also especially with young learners, I think this is really important that somehow you make it accessible to them at a young age and it sounds like you're doing a really fantastic job of that. And congratulations as well on this playbook. This sounds really exciting and I think many teachers will take advantage of that as well. Next I would like to turn to Javera, Rana, to also give some insights into how you're teaching in the classroom. Also early childhood I believe especially is your specialty. Well, not exactly early childhood, actually I teach primary as well as secondary. Thank you so much Julia. Actually mission 4.7 is all about transformative education. This is an education that will make our children lifelong learners and it will make them more empathetic citizens of the world who believe in more inclusion, more cultural diversity and equal opportunities. So if you if you just can allow me to share my screen and I'll take you guys, you know, a quick drive through what my students have been doing in the classroom in terms of lessons and project and everything. Can I just share my screen? Yeah, you should have access. Go ahead. Okay, so all my students, you know, it was like we decided upon that while we'll be learning about in five months we'll be implementing. Sorry. Yeah, so it was a series of lessons that I did with my students and by the end of this which span over five months will be work with a team to plan and conduct many social action projects and also learning of SDGs and real implementation of SDGs and global citizenship in classroom and beyond. And also I believe that, you know, when you set a target it's very important to measure your success. So my students made it a point to evaluate the success of their social action projects in the end. So what they did was they made groups and they selected the cost that the Gold Research and Plan took action and evaluated. From time to time we can all feel that our world could be changed for the better. That was a decision our environment could be cleaner and our wildlife could be better protected. And then more could be done to end poverty in country in Pakistan, especially in South Asia and overseas. And humans could live more peacefully together and promote global citizenship. So there could be more support for people going through difficult times. You know, many targets set because when people work together to tackle a problem in the world we say that they are, you know, supporting a cause. I would like to take you through to my students work quickly. So these are, you know, these are the pointers that my students actually made that what they will be doing. Reducing, reusing, recycling is very easy to do because we can start it, start it at the personal level quickly through this. So what they did was they not only interviewed experts, they made online reports, magazines, they surveyed people, they read a few books about it, documentaries, case studies, they searched online. So what they did was they gather a lot of source information to check what they can do. They even wrote letters to the Minister of Climate Change, actually Pakistan is fortunate. I think because Pakistan is one of the countries that is very, very vulnerable to climate change, one of the top 10, I believe. So we have a climate ministry and the Minister of the Dark School, my students actually wrote letters to the Minister of Climate Change. They also made behavioral changes like, you know, not using the plastic bottles, not using the polythene bags, maybe taking, you know, a cotton bag for shopping, small things that really start at the personal level. This is all reduced to use, recycle, and also repurpose. I would like to add into these Rs. I think repurposing is also very important. They even did fundraising quickly through to the actual student work I want to take you guys. So, so, you know, what my students actually decided in the end about all these documentaries and surveys and everything that they have a power and they have a voice, they can use it not only to change themselves, but people in their house, in their communities, in the country, and then beyond. So what they did was how they can use their voice and experiential learning to transform and make personal decisions that have an environmental impact. So this is my school actually doing reducing, reusing, recycle campaign and thinking green where, you know, make a card for your parents with suggestions on how to be a green consumer. That's that's what they did. This is me demonstrating about climate change in the school, a conference that we did with the students. And this is students work. Now what they did was for this campaign, they use all discarded, you can see these newspapers, newspapers and all the old discarded cotton boxes and chart papers and for the awareness drive. So this is all the recycled, recycled today for a better tomorrow. That's the wall they made in the school. You can see the students in action, you know, saving the planet. And this, this, this one is really very interesting because, you know, why how my students actually knew that they have a voice and their that voice is very powerful. As I live in Pakistan in the province of Punjab, so they contacted the horticulture department of Punjab and what the government did was allotted my students a plot near the school where my, my students did the planting drive. Every student has a plant in their name, and they actually go there and look after that plant. So you can see my students planting. Then we, then we talked about, you know, good health and well being how important it is for my students to know what good health, we all keep on saying that good health is important. But then who is responsible for that good health? You, me, society, community, WHO, the doctors. So, you know, it was important for my students to learn who was actually responsible. And not only they understood what their duties are, but what their responsibilities, who has responsibility of doing what and the action they took while they, they, you know, wrote letters to, because of the ongoing pandemic, you know, how much pressurized our medical facility. So they, so they recorded messages on Flipgrid, thank you messages, you know, some, some moms, they baked cakes for them. And they also like send postcards and letters to them. So the activity was very interesting. So how my students really incorporated it was they, you know, they had to write a health recipe and map for the walk and also instructions on how to create a fun game that is physical and so that their health can be better. This one is a float. This is, this is beautiful. This, this float, we, you know, drove through the whole city. I live in Lahore city, the whole city of Lahore, where this is a campaign drive for not only climate action, but also global citizenship, peace, and humanity. You can see humanity, humility, you know, there were many posters. It was all created by school students. Then we had a lesson with global citizenship education where my students actually learned what global citizenship is and how they can do it, how they can be more inclusive as maybe, you know, contact schools overseas and do projects with students in, in other schools in the, in the world. And also like food security is very no hunger is very important because Pakistan is one of the most food insecure countries in the world. And in the risking factor, it's ranking 11th. And there is another very surprising fact I would like to tell you is despite the fact of this insecurity, 40% of food wasted globally is in Pakistan. So this is, so this is the project. They were like, how they chose their projects, the resources they need, the actions they want to do, they actually did the whole survey of this is the experimentation part where they are to understand the temperatures like how temperatures are writing, they are rising, they may have processes, observations, conclusions. And also thinking what is important is we have to think globally but then act locally because everything has to begin, you know, like they say charity begins and form. So such things also they begin at home, they need to know how they can be more greener, how they can plant, how they can plant more, how they can be energy efficient in school and at home, how they can watch what they eat. Javier, this is really wonderful. You have so many wonderful examples. So I'm just a poster. This is the Malalik. So these posters and just the poster, the climate pledges and the letters. Thank you. So there were seven projects, actually they did seven projects, seven projects, fantastic. So really seeing the actually coming into action. So the gaining the knowledge, gaining the awareness and then actually taking action in these thinking globally, acting locally projects. This is really a fantastic example. Thank you so much for sharing all of these. That's great. And then Lillian, who actually is the childhood, early childhood more specialist and enthusiast for ESD. I want to turn to you now to tell us our youngest learners, how you're communicating about 4.7 in the classroom. Thank you so much for this opportunity and this forum to share. My understanding of early childhood is that of an age group that is very receptive to what is going on around them and also that is vulnerable to effects of any undoing with the society as adults and everything that is going on around them. They bear the brand of everything that is happening around them. I look at sustainable development as a powerful tool through which these values can be passed on to our young youngest citizens. I call them youngest global citizens because they are also a powerful segment of our society in terms of advocacy because they take it in, they are receptive and they are also able to take it out as it is and they are also take in what they believe in. So it is a good group to work with in advocacy and anything that you are looking into bringing forward. As I look at the areas of sustainability, SDG and global citizens, for sustainable development I tend to break it down into the three pillars and I tackle each pillar as it is for better understanding of these young learners. For example, when you look at the environment pillar of ESD, we explore the environment. I tend to open their eyes into the environment as it is. How have we endured? What do we have? What are the effects of our practices around the environment? We are lucky as a country in our education sector to have our activity areas in every level of education coined towards ESD that gives us a room to practice this, especially the environmental activity area where we have a topic that is called entrepreneurship project, for example. Then we have animals and plants. So this gives us an opportunity to study the environment march and also look at the entrepreneurship activities around us. So this brings in also the aspect of economic pillar. So under the economic pillar we also look at the economic activities that are done and we expose them to them. For example, they even go to making beadwork. They do art activities. When we expose them to the environment, we take them to the we have art projects which they are also able to sell and make some little money and also in the process they learn how to invest, they learn how to negotiate for their prices. They learn how to even put value on whatever products they come up with because in the process of negotiation you have to put a price tag and you have to convince the buyer that this is going to this much because of a put in one, two, three and they are also learning their value in terms of their skills. And also as we look at the environment also, we open their eyes to scarcity, for example, food insecurity and stuff like that, the quite existence around our environment, how we quite exist with animals, for example, human to human and we expose them to the natural resources. For example, Kenya is a rich environment. We are blessed with tourism so they need to know how the revenue is collected, how much of it from tourism. In the process, they get to know who are these tourists who come to our country, where do they come from, so they get interested to know which countries are they coming from, what is their culture, for example, what do they do, why do they come here, what do they have or wherever they are coming from. So I also emphasize on sustainable farming. We happen to live in an urban setting where the space is shrinking, there is very little space so not much farming can take place but that doesn't mean that you go hungry because we are also looking at the SDG, the zero hunger and all the areas that we are supposed to tackle. So there is always a solution to every problem and we also need to think critically. So we open their mind into thinking critically on how to solve their problems. So I send them to, we do some little farming, sustainable farming within the classroom and also this is extended at home. So they do this at home, they come up with their products which sometimes is exchanged into some cash of some sort. As we look at the global citizenship, there's also the aspect of opening their eyes into the global arena, even as we are at local. So our curriculum also, our education system has eight national goals which are very strong and the first goal is on nationalism and patriotism. So I bring that into them, looking at the heritage, looking at what we endowed with as a country and also the goal number seven talks about global consciousness and also appreciating other nations and respect for other nations. So in this manner, we also do beadwork, we also do artwork. The beadwork we make, children make bracelets of colors of different countries and as a research on various countries of their choice and also particularly of Kenya. If I may just share my screen a bit just in a nutshell of what we do, I hope that is okay. So this is an environment as we were exploring the environment, we go literally to the woods and they look at what we have, they explore, they look at the coexistence within the environment and they study what is there. So at the end of the excursion or the trip, they report on what they have seen. So this other one, they make animals with leaves and the materials that they collect from the environment just to connect the coexistence around and on matters scarcity because this is why the sustainable development or education is there because of the challenges that we've had in our existence. So as we look at scarcity, they also explore ways of tackling this issue because if we cannot afford to buy materials, I'm a play advocate and I encourage a lot of play, but how do we do this with scarce materials? So they have to develop this from the available locally available resources that are also perceived as waste. So they make materials, play materials that will enable their play, which we also call sustainable play because it has to continue, play will never stop and learning also has to go on. So we have to come up with materials made from, they make them themselves, we make them together and they continue with their learning and their play. I also, I'm very sorry to cut this short or maybe you can give one more example just because I'm conscious of time and then we'll move on to the next question, but these are really fantastic. So maybe one more example and then we'll move on to the next. Okay, another one is on celebration of international global days. For example, like today is an international day of peace. We also look at that and tie it to the conflicts that we have because the idea is to minimize or even stop conflicts and violence at all. So we look, we explore that in terms of environment because environment forms a big percentage of our conflict because of the shrinking space and resources that we have. So we encourage, I encourage them into finding solution, tri-planting, finding peace, recycling, reusing and all that to minimize and to, on violence by providing more materials and more resources, enough resources for everyone. Thank you. Thank you so much Lillian and just proved to show that it's never too young to learn about these topics and to also challenge young people to think even entrepreneurially about how they can fund projects and make something sustainable efforts. It's really fantastic. I'm going to pass back over to my co-moderator Chandrika for the next question. Thank you, Julia. And can I just echo what a fantastic and inspiring set of examples you've given us. You know, you are, all of you are obviously exceptional at this, but you're also in a minority. Most teachers in the world do not put in the kind of effort and time and energy that you put into your classrooms. And, you know, it is a challenge. So just from your perspective and everything that you've done and seen around you, what are the two things that you think need to change so that something like the SDGs, the global citizenship 4.7 can be taught in classrooms. So two things, one, from the perspective of the classroom. So what is it that teachers need to do differently? That is the first question. And then the second is in the system, in the education system, what needs to change that could allow teachers to be more effective in classrooms. And we'll do a reverse this time. So Lillian, let me start with you and ask you if you could give us two of your thoughts on what would really help us succeed. Well, thank you so much. I'll start with the classroom as a teacher based on the practice that I've had and based on even the reaction within the colleague setup. This requires one to go beyond the comfort zone and to put in an extra, go an extra mile in terms of practice so that all of this can be achieved. And it seems like too much work. The first thing that needs to change is that teachers need to expand the learning space. That one has to happen. Learning should be taken beyond the confines of the four walls of a classroom. And it is important that teachers utilize the outdoor space. Going by the word of one educator that the best classroom is one that is moved by the sky. And in the outdoor, there's so much to learn about because this engages all their senses and children are engaged and they're able to observe, they're able to analyze, they're able to make decisions based on what they're seeing and based on all their senses. So it is important that the learning space is expanded and that the teachers look beyond the syllabus. We are living in a world where it's competitive. It's really a competition of results of exams, exam oriented and stuff like that. And this minimizes the space and the practices for the teacher. So if the teacher is able to look beyond the syllabus and expand and explore all these other approaches, it would be a rich classroom with a complete set of outcomes that we are looking for. And as far as the government, I mean the education system is concerned, I would look at a shift away from exams also because this is a policy that comes from the government. So the education should respond to the new trends, the new challenges, for example, emerging issues and potential challenges. These are challenges that have not come, but we are seeing the potential of them occurring. If the education system would constantly look at potential challenges and look at the emerging issues and look at the new trends and focus on equality, focus on promoting peace and nurturing global citizens, then we would have a rich form of education for these children. Excellent, really helpful and really I think insightful comments. Let's turn to Javier. Okay, so see, I believe that we can use all the fancy words that we wanted to use, but then really it has to start, let's say at the grassroots level, like Lili also said, that right there at the kindergarten level. See, it's very easy, children can connect to their own needs and their own rights better. So what we can do is we can start telling them about their rights and then their responsibilities and eventually human rights and then gender equality and then global citizenship. It's really as easy as that. We have to empower our students to be leaders. They have to stop and think about the world around them. See, because you know for the women instill in their young hearts and minds the importance of lifelong learning. And for that there needs to be a shift from the like also Lillian, I totally agree with Lillian when she said that we need to make a shift from the exam or only exam oriented and result oriented studies towards a skill development and concept based inquiry. Our curriculum needs to be more flexible, more inclusive and global. Teaching practices should involve collaboration, communication with educators globally and on the classroom level we can, what we can do is we can encourage our children to read books about citizenship. We have to give them a free hand and opportunity where they can, you know, write prose or poems, be a free writer, maybe draw, paint, posters, you know, discuss about how different books, characters, display citizenship. They can also, we can give them opportunities to work on projects that involve other schools in other countries. When it comes to the government and the system of education on a broader level, every country which is a signatory of the Berlin Declaration that was adopted in May 2021 should keep it as the guiding chart for forming national curriculums because every national curriculum should aim to develop a sense and an awareness of the interconnectedness among people, societies, environments around the globe. Let's be honest, like the saying goes, you know, this is, this is, we have no planet B, this is the one we have. So to live together with peace and harmony, you know, to thrive on it, to develop on it, our students are our agents of change. When students develop a sense of global citizenship, they will learn to respect the seminal universal values such as peace, equality, equity, lifelong learning opportunities, sustainability, and upholding the human rights and dignity of all people. So the government needs to revive this policy be more flexible, you know, and stop the rigid, the rigid curriculum that we have. Yeah. Yeah, excellent. So I think there's, there are clear themes coming out from, from both of your interventions. Let's continue the discussion and turn to Santa, if you can give us also one example of what should change in the classroom and one system wide. Well, if you see like many teachers who teach SDGs in classroom, they are alone. And I would tell you, you are not alone, because you are the drive, you are the change maker, you learn about the SDGs and you're doing it for your students. Think that your attitude has to change. Why in the first place, why are you and educated in the first place? And think about how you were as a student before your children in this classroom, your students are in the classroom, wants to see exemplary teachers, and you were students before, and you had the experience of having good teachers and bad teachers. I would say it out loud here. Why can't you be that good teacher and, you know, create the change, even if you are one person in the school, create the SDG environment in the classroom, be there with the ecosystem of sustainable development and global citizenship in the classroom with your students. You create that. I know teachers like, you know, due to COVID and those kind of things, we complain about a lot of work. But if you really want your students to learn to be better leaders later, who's going to, you know, create policies for us when we grow old, you need to give them the platform today. It's an ongoing process. And speaking about the policy and the government, I would encourage governments out there. How many teachers are there actually having a seat in the policy-making structure? How many teachers out there is given the seat to actually say a word, hey, I want this in my policy, and this is going to be beneficial for primary schools, secondary schools, tertiary level. How many teachers out there are actually given the seat in policy-making? And I echo what Lillian and Javera were saying. But if we are only going to be, you know, in our cocoon, teaching at schools and not given the platform to go beyond, we tend to deviate out of the government. We tend to find like, you know, SDSN, you know, SDG Academy, even this one, to, you know, to allow our voice to be heard. If our government is not supporting us, if that is, yes, you know, give us the platform. We want to do more. So attitude one side and giving us the seat the other side. Yeah. Excellent. Very important. And this is a message that we even for sure take into our work moving forward. Let me turn to George now. George, over to you. One thing to change in the classroom and one systemic change. I think it's all about connectivity for like bringing school closer to the community. So as a teacher, you should be equipped with the concepts about SDGs. You should start within yourself. And in such a way that you're able to convey the message to the community. In my case, I have this school organization, and I was able to inject to them the SDG concept, where we were able to come up with a community based project. So we adopted one community here, closer to our school, where most of our students reside. As a history, we were able to put up Project Basura or Project Trash, where most of the recipients are mothers of our students. So we call it scavenger matters, because it is in Barangay Felisa. And this Barangay Felisa is the host. It's our city's host for Sanitary Land Field Dam site, where most of our students mothers are doing the scavenging in order to support their daily needs in our school. So applying the principle of research, since I am teaching research, I was able to come up with this program and applying SDG concepts through my club, and we were able to establish the mothers. We were able to organize them and we come up this upcycling livelihood program, and we trained them. We partnered with training institutions, like the Department of Trade and Industry. And finally, we were able to receive a fine grant for that, for their livelihood. And we were able to come up projects like Project Dolls or Mascara Dolls, out of the waste. So we were able to come up with other crafts, products, and other forms of livelihood like food production, food processing, as a proceed of their earnings out of the proceeds. George, this is a great example of what can happen inside the classroom. But if you look at the system of education in the Philippines, what do you think needs to change? I think literally nothing has to change, but I think to revisit or modify some of the curriculum aspects, because here, SDGs is not much of really a concern for each teacher here. So that's why I said that it should start with the teacher. Like in my case, I really allowed myself to be trained with the Global Schools program, where I was able to devise my own tool, and I was able to come up with a unified learning action matrix, where this is a two-pronged approach, where as my guide, as my rubric, I was able to integrate SDGs in global citizenship education. And later on, it has been adopted here in our division, where learning area supervisors were trained. And later on, just recently, we have our inset or in-service training, where the entire division of Bacoled City were close to 8,000 teachers in the workforce teaching force were able to avail of that training through our division office. So I think it's high time for us to really not just teach, but really to advocate SDGs, and just only to integrate the concept, but really to lead the pack as teachers, as educators of the world. We really need to advocate out of the confines of the four corners of our classroom. So through advocacy, we can integrate a lot of projects. Yeah, applying the principle of bringing school to the community, we can integrate SDGs. Excellent, thank you so much. So go to the community, that's the lesson from George. We are rapidly running out of time, so we will wrap up this discussion. We're going to do a little bit of a rapid fire around here. And we're going to go around to all of you and ask you to, in under two sentences, tell us one piece of advice that you would give to a teacher who is listening in and who maybe wants to do this, a teacher who's maybe a little bit indifferent, or a teacher who's just too burdened with their ongoing workloads to be able to do it, even if they cared. So just your, you know, things that you wish you would have, somebody would have told you when you started on this journey. We're going to start Santa with you. So as I said, it's going to be rapid fire, you have two sentences. Go. All right, I would say if BTS can make it to the UN, you also can make it to the UN teachers. So I'm creating a white paper currently, rebooting the education system, post pandemic, so it has given us all the opportunities. So if anyone of you wants to create that solution together, you can join me. But a simple thing, if BTS can make it, why can't all of you teachers, so yeah. Great. Javier. My advice is actually just one sentence, but I will just elaborate it into two sentences. My advice is teachers, educate yourself and others, because there's a Chinese proverb that if you're planning for a year, you know, you're so right. If you're planning for a decade, plant trees, if you're planning for a lifetime, educate people, please teachers, give your time, skill, commitment to educate yourself, your colleagues, peers, friends, teachers, community about shared global goals of Mission 4.7, get informed about them, please. Explore the realities of global goals and what they mean for your country and for the whole planet. Yes. Thank you. Excellent. Lillian. I would tell teachers, please teach for future, teach for sustainability. Is it just me? Lillian seems to have, we seem to have lost her connection. Lillian, you're back. We lost you. So you can say it again. Okay. I would tell teachers to teach for future, teach for sustainable future, teach the values, cohesion, human humanity, human rights, focus on the needs and potential future needs and that will get it right. Excellent. George, you have the final word in under a minute. Yes. As teachers, you must be an advocate. You must have a character for a kid. So what is this character for a kid? See, compassion to teach, each heart for and love for teaching, a advocate for SGGs and R, respect for your learners, a advocate for GZ and C, culture-based education, T, temperament to teach, E and the chasms to teach and R, reliable, reflective, reciprocal as a teacher for a kid to know, imagine and do it by themselves. So teachers must have the character for a kid. Excellent. What a wonderful summing up. So that brings us to the end of a really, really fascinating and inspiring discussion. I think to hear straight from the classrooms to see all the wonderful work that all of you are doing and give us so many ideas and hopefully to give our audience so many ideas. So I'm going to turn it over to Julia to help us close and really go back with some fantastic memories of the session. Julia, over to you. Thank you. Thank you, everyone, for our wonderful speakers today and for sharing these incredible examples of your work, your feedback on areas where it can improve in the classroom and in policy, but also your advice for other teachers. I think it's really inspiring. I know a few teachers are definitely listening today and I hope they really take this to heart. You all represent incredible leaders in the education space in your own right and the fact that you've taken the opportunity and the initiative to really educate yourselves, educate others and platform these important ideas that cannot wait must be taught now to all ages across the lifespan. Developing lifelong learning as a passion for young people is, I think, is really a remarkable thing to do as a person. So I will just echo what you said before, your advice for other teachers again, because I think it was just so lovely, all of them. So if BTS can do it, so can you from Santa. Teachers educate yourself and others. This was very good one from Javierra that it's important to be able to educate yourself and others. Teach for the future, Lillian, that this is really important and George to be advocates as a teacher. So all of you are just that and I thank you very much for for sharing your insights today and I hope that everyone takes takes it with them into the rest of their teaching and lives. Thank you very much. Thank you. Stay tuned for ICSD tomorrow. Thank you.