Although the chemicals in the ink that make Sharpies permanent come from stars billions of years ago, humans have found many creative ways to use Sharpies, and also discovered the impacts that Sharpies can have on human’s health.
The History of Big History
Many people know what history is, but what is Big History? Big History is the study of the universe on a large scale from The Big Bang to the future. Big History is divided into thresholds, major events in the universe that have shaped it to the way it is today. David Christian, a historian and the creator of Big History, shaped this course to involve both social studies and science aspects to better student’s reading, writing, and knowledge. The Little Big History project is the student’s own version of Big History for an object of their choice. The object of study, Sharpie markers, was chosen because they are bright and colorful and have so many possibilities and not many people want to look deeper into what makes them special and how Sharpies relate to disciplines in different areas such as medical fields that look into how Sharpies can be a danger to humans.
David Christian explains what his vision was for Big History as describing it as a “unifying story” to give him a sense of the history of the universe’s existence. Without Christian's desire to create such a story there would be no Big History course and no unique history class to get students to think outside the box and be challenged in different ways. An idea became a course that has inspired kids to dream bigger and think more. David Christian accomplished his goal, but also set a new standard for education by combining multiple disciplines into one overall amazing course, Big History.
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This map shows the seven continents and where Sharpies were sold the most according to the Sharpie annual report for sales in 2013. This proves that Sharpies are a world-wide product that different societies and cultures all over can use Sharpies no matter what background people come from. Timothy Goodman is a famous Sharpie artist known for decorating murals and cars with Sharpie designs, in his book, Sharpie Art Workshop, he has a quote that greatly relates to this, “It {Sharpies} crosses over into so many genres, backgrounds, ages, and beliefs.” Goodman’s opinion and this map relate to each other by showing the diversity of where Sharpies appear across the world.