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UK schools join in ‘The World’s Biggest Lesson’ to remind world leaders of their promise to get every child worldwide into school.

Hundreds of schools around the UK will be aiming to get into the Guinness Book of Records during the “Worlds’ Biggest Lesson” on Wednesday 23 April. They will join young people in 120 countries who will be taught the same ‘core lesson’ simultaneously in two time zones.

Deaf Child Worldwide is a partner of the Global Campaign for Education (GCE), the coalition of charities organising the event. The lesson is a reminder to world leaders to keep their promise that every child in the world would complete a quality primary education by 2015.

With only seven years to go to meeting the Millennium Development Goal of universal primary education, 72 million children are still missing out on a primary education, with millions more forced to drop out of school before they can complete even a basic education.

Around the world:

• Grammy award-winning artist Shakira will appear alongside students on Capitol Hill in Washington to lend her support to the campaign. On Monday 21 April Shakira will hold a telephone conference with Gordon Brown to discuss the global education crisis.
• Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel will receive her school report card marking her grades on providing Education for All.
• In Cambodia, King Sihamoni will take part in the World’s Biggest Lesson and be taught by children who've been excluded from education and adult learners.
• Afghanistan’s President Hamid Karzai is also expected to take part at Isteqlal High School in Kabu.
• In Kenya, the World's Biggest Lesson is taking place in a Nairobi slum and will focus on how to address the needs of those who've been excluded from school following the recent violence.
• In Mozambique, 'Major Aula' (the World's Biggest Lesson) is taking place in schools nationwide, and for some pupils it will be their first chance to sit in class, having previously been excluded because of a disability or being orphaned.     
  

Since 2000, millions of schoolchildren all over the world have taken part in the campaign to make sure that the promise that all children get a quality education is not forgotten. As a result, some governments, including the UK, are doing more and the estimate for the numbers of children out of school has fallen from 100 million to 72 million. 

The World’s Biggest Lesson marks the start of Send My Friend ’08. Following this, schoolchildren in the UK will be inviting their MP’s to get creative by completing a ‘missing out’ action card to be part of their school display. The cards will then be sent to the Prime Minister before he flies off to the G8 in Japan at the end of June.  

For free resources and more information visit the Send My Friend website.