The new book Growing Up Global: Raising Children to Be At Home in the World offers a toolbox for helping kids in grades K-12 feel connected with the world, through both profound and fun ideas and activities. One chapter is dedicated to Play! this includes ideas for table games, like backgammon, Risk and more that help connect families with a global experience, as well as many geography games using a simple globe or atlas, which my own family has enjoyed.

Another idea for families staying home, and wanting to have fun on a budget: dinner and a movie at home, but this time it’s family-friendly foreign movies. Your family night could go to Japan, India, Iran, Ireland – almost wherever you like, with suggestions from Growing Up Global to get you started.

The chapter on See the World – Read a Movie offers dozens of suggestions, all with films easily accessible through public libraries or Netflix. These have been harder for families to connect to, as many are unrated so it’s difficult to decide what to watch. Growing Up Global also offers age-appropriate guidelines for these films.

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