Focusing on a students living situation is important not only for what they experience at home but also what they experience in their community. Because I teach at international private schools I know that most of my students come from wealthier families where they have no worries about where their dinner is coming from. But when we walk out into our community we see extreme poverty among the local Chinese people. I would be doing a great disservice as their teacher if I did not draw attention to this issue, or teacher them how to feel empathy for others. Dr. Donna Wilson and Dr. Marcus Conyers state in their article Four Proven Strategies to Teaching Empathy “empathy has the capacity to transform individual lives for the better while helping to bring about positive social change in schools and communities worldwide”. By bringing issues they face in the real world into our classroom, I am preparing them not just for the lesson, but for life.