Hi Katie,
Welcome to the course and thanks for sharing your thoughts with us. The inclusive classroom that encourages critical thinking and empathy sounds like a wonderful learning environment. As educators, we must do all we can to create this environment. You will see throughout the course how the main development education themes lend themselves to this. There is much opportunity for the children to compare the reality in a local context with the reality on a global level. Children can then decide what actions can / should be taken at the different levels to rectify (or take steps tor rectify) the issues.