I love how this unit really brings to life a part of history that potentially could seem out of touch with the students' current experiences.  This could easily be tied to the dissention in our modern political climate and how the different approaches to government and personal philosphy seep deeply into our every day lives.  This is a great activity to have the students split up into four groups and research and study the four different philosophies and then have a discussion to ask questions amongst the different groups.  It could be taken a step further and students have to find a modern philosophy or current event or group that relates to their assigned philosophy.  This whole unit is a great way to introduce students to a place and time that may seem very out of reach for them.  They could work to take the most recent events about Chinese industrialization and protests and try to see the similarities and differences between China of the 6th century B.C. to today.

I can apply today's lesson in my AP Spanish curriculum.  The AP Spanish Language and Culture exam asks the students to compare and contrast two different cultures.  I am interested in a few things: the pottery, religion and dynasties.  Students can compare the chinese pottery and the aztec pottery.  What does the pottery say about the lifestyle of the two cultures? As for religion, we can discuss the different gods/saints in each culture and find similarities.  Find a god/saint from each culture that are similar and explain it to the class.  As for dynasty/empires, we can talk about the different dynasty/empires in China and Spain and talk about the impact each had on society. 

If I were a high school teacher, this unit has the potential to be very engaging and topical. A fun, relatable opening activity might be to create a survey that questions students about their interests and then assigns them to the different philosophies/schools, much like the Sorting Hat does in the Harry Potter series. Of course, there might need to be some maneuvering or planning on the my part to make sure students are divided as equally as possible.

I'm not a fan of assigning screentime, but if students will be on their technology anyway, an extension activity (for extra credit?) might be for them to apply their philosophies and practices to a world-building game such as Emperor: Rise of the Middle Kingdon... or code their own!

It is interesting to see a country where philosophy has such a distinct and impactful history on political and societal outcomes.  We see how in the US today our president likes to misinterpret things according to his own desire.  It seems that Chinese leaders often do the same thing.  They reinterpret history and embrace or reject aspects of it to suit their current desired narrative.  As someone with a history degree, I wish more leaders held the truth in high regard.  I wonder how much history in China has been completely ommitted from current understanding due to various purges over the millenia.  

There are so many correlations between some of the ancient Chinese leaders and ancient Egyptian leaders.  I know little about Chinese history and wonder what the communication between those two areas of the world was like over the centuries.  The afterlife tombs with riches and art work correlate so well.  I wonder if the oracle bones were influential to a majority of every day residents or if they were mostly for upperclass members of society.

The Hundred Schools activity is a great unit that allows students to explore Chinese philosophies and the foundations for which the country was built. It's a great way to get students engaged and empowered to learn about history from so long ago. I would do the same thing we did in our session this afternoon with students, allowing them to pick a school of thought that closely relates to their own personal values. This allows student choice and ownership which is essential for student participation and engagement. If I taught high school I would definitely include this in my curriculum. There are so many extension activities that could also be born from this unit. After the debate, students can do a comparison to modern philosophies. I could also see a cross-curricular opportunity with an English teacher to compare Chinese philosophies to philosophical schools of thought from other countries, cultures, or religions.  

The Hundred Schools lesson design seems perfect for middle school to high school ages. In order to connect elementary age students to this content, I would try a debate, but I would definitely have students adopt one ideology to focus on and work with others to unpack first. Students could research multiple sources and then create a poster for their school of thought to present to others. Then perhaps, there can be a gallery walk and debate. This type of learning activity is very effective for increasing student engagement. 

I was also thinking that we could tie the study of artifacts and thinking like an achaeologist to the local communities we study in our social studies standards. I would be interested to have students look at artifacts from different communities that were used for a similar purpose during the same time period. For example, students could compare and contrast tools used for cooking across two or more different cultures. In my case, we study the Tongva Indians in third grade and I could make the comparison with an indigenous group from China. I'm sure we would find more similarities than differences.