Big History                     Secondary

The Five Great lessons unify the parts of the elementary curriculum into one epic and thrilling story that ignites the imagination of the child, but the secondary curriculum - especially in public high schools - gets fragmented and never put back together again. The adolescent needs a meaningful curriculum that orients them to their time and their cosmic task. David Christian’s Big History approach aligns with the cosmic curriculum both methodologically and philosophically. Rather than 5 Great Lessons, Big History uses 8 thresholds of increasing complexity to unify the story of the universe, our planet, life, and humanity. Big History connects the otherwise isolated territories of modern scholarship into a map of space and time that orients students to where they came from, where they are, and where they are going. In this way, Big History stokes the flames of imagination sparked in the second plane and furthers the sense of purpose, reverence, independence, and responsibility fostered by the cosmic curriculum.