1 in 8 Billion · 1in8b.me

Classroom mode: a guide for teachers

1 in 8 Billion (1in8b.me) is a free life simulation: you are born as one of the babies arriving on Earth right now and live that person's life to the end, inside the real statistics of 172 countries and territories. Classroom mode is the same simulation made ready for a lesson: heavier themes are held back, and posting and payments are off. It opens in the browser, with no sign-up and nothing to install.

• What is 1 in 8 Billion?
• What classroom mode changes
• Pupils' information
• Getting ready
• A 40-minute lesson
• Ideas by subject
• The class code
• After a life: the worksheet
• Questions teachers ask
• Contact

What is 1 in 8 Billion?

A life simulation in which you are born without choosing where, and live one person's whole life from birth to death. The country, the family and its means are drawn from real birth statistics, and the life that follows goes by that country's real statistics on life expectancy, income, schooling, health and more. It is made so you can feel for yourself that life is given by chance, that it happens once, and that the world is wide and full of people living differently.

From public statistics: UN World Population Prospects 2024 (births, population, life expectancy, fertility), UN IGME (child mortality), WHO and UN MMEIG (maternal mortality, tobacco, road deaths), UNDP and UNESCO (education), the World Bank (income, inequality, health spending), ILO (employment in agriculture), UNAIDS (HIV), UNODC (homicide), UNICEF (child marriage) and the World Happiness Report. Income is drawn from the country's income distribution (Gini index). Some missing values were estimated from regional averages and similar methods, and most facts carry their source beside them. The figures by country are on All 172 countries.

What classroom mode changes

Ages 12 and up is not an official rating but a guideline 1 in 8 Billion set for itself. It follows the 12+ level of Korea's age ratings and errs on the careful side.

• Left out: suicide, violence and physical punishment at home, choosing for yourself to drink, smoke, gamble, commit a crime or have an affair, the lottery, and the past and future worlds. Drug dependence, sexual violence and assisted dying in the family do not come up either.
• Kept as they are: poverty, illness, war and fleeing, early death, divorce and remarriage, and losing family happen as often as the real statistics say. Early marriage and giving birth young, families with one husband and several wives, a spouse's affair, deaths from violence or drugs, and HIV also appear at each country's real rates. Meeting the world as it really is, is the point of the simulation, so these are not held back. No cruel scene is shown.
• The world's many kinds of lives appear at their real shares too. There are many faiths and cultures, families of more than one background, lives with a disability, lives of people who love someone of the same sex, and transgender and non-binary lives. Every life is told with respect.
• When a life ends before 15, the record opens with why, and a question to think over together.
• Shared lives (strangers' words) and posting, social sharing, feedback and problem reports, moving records, keepsakes and memorials, and payments are all off. Lives are lived in today's world only; the past appears only in the lab's 'Across the years'.

Pupils' information

In classroom mode, pupils’ writing and saved lives stay on their device. The game does not send their gameplay or community content to the shared service. No sign-up is required; the hosting provider still processes ordinary web requests. Cloudflare Web Analytics measures visits and page-loading performance. Saved lives, classroom writing and form answers are not included in these measurements.

Getting ready

1. Living a life or two yourself before class helps you prepare what to talk about with the children.
2. On your device, tap 'Open in classroom mode' above (it is also in the last lines of the first screen). When 'Classroom' shows at the top, it is on.
3. Tap 'Open the classroom lab' on the first screen and open the 'Lesson guide' tab: the pupils' address is there, with a copy button and a QR code. Give it to your pupils on the board or the class page.
4. To have everyone born as the same baby, tap 'Make a class code' in the same tab (see 'The class code' below).

The pupils' screen follows the same classroom rules and has the class code box, but not the lab or the guide for teachers. There are no accounts, so the pupils' and the teacher's screens are kept apart, not locked.

A 40-minute lesson

The lab's 'Lesson guide' tab has the same plan, ready to print.

1. Opening (5 min): look at the numbers on the first screen together. About four babies are born every second. If you cannot choose where you are born, what kind of life might be waiting?
2. Same start (15 min): with the class code everyone is born as the same baby; live to somewhere between ten and fifteen, then pause. Talk about what stayed the same and what became different.
3. Same day, different countries, or Across the years (10 min): look at five lives side by side and find what differed most.
4. World lab (5 min): let 300 babies be born and compare the share who lived to five with the real statistic.
5. Closing (5 min): pick one life you met today and write one line you would like to say to that person.

Questions to talk about

• What could you not choose, and what could you choose?
• What divided the lives of children born on the same day the most?
• In the same country, how did life change with the year of birth?
• What would it take for fewer children to die before they turn five?
• What did you learn from the life of someone born somewhere very different from you?

Good to know

• Each life in the lab is one possibility drawn from odds set by real statistics. The numbers change a little with every run.
• Lab lives are worked out on this device only and are not kept in records or the memorial.
• They follow the same rules as classroom mode: no suicide, no violence at home, and no choosing to drink, smoke, gamble or commit a crime.
• In Across the years, the past brings war, famine and mass killings as often as they really happened. No cruel scenes are drawn.
• Sources: UN World Population Prospects 2024 (births, life expectancy, child deaths in past years), UN IGME (deaths before five), UNESCO and UNDP (education).

Ideas by subject

Social studies: where you are born

Let everyone be born without a class code and collect the countries on the board. Countries where many babies are born, such as India, China, Nigeria and Pakistan, come up often. With the lab's 'Same day, different countries', set five lives born on the same day side by side and talk about what divided them most.

Maths and statistics: reading real figures

In the 'World lab', have 100, 300 or 1,000 babies born and compare the share who reached five, schooling at 25 and the ages at death with the real figures beside them. The more lives, the closer to the real value, while one person's life can be far from the average. Each country's figures are in all 172 countries.

Ethics: diversity and respect

Pick one life born somewhere very different and tell one of its years from that person's side. Faiths and cultures, disability, and whom people love appear at their real shares, each told with respect. Pupils can also list what that person could not choose and what they could.

History: across the years

The lab's 'Across the years' sets side by side children born in one country in 1950, 1970, 1990, 2010 and this year. Talk about how life expectancy and deaths before five changed, and how history such as war and famine reached one person's life. The past comes as often as it happened, with no cruel scene shown.

The class code

In the lab's 'Lesson guide', 'Make a class code' gives a four-digit number. Write this number on the board. When students type it into 'Class code' on the first screen and are born, everyone who typed the same number is born as the same baby. From the next year on, each lives by their own choices and luck.

A number gives the same baby for today only. Tomorrow the same number brings a different baby.

In Classroom, a life once born is lived to its end. When this life ends, you can be born again. Typing a class code starts a new life as that code's baby, even while another life is going on.

After a life: the worksheet

When a life ends, 'Print as a worksheet' in the record prints a worksheet looking back on that life. The finished life's card can also be saved as a picture on the device for a presentation or a worksheet.

Questions teachers ask

How long does a life take? Can it go faster?

You choose about 30 minutes, about 1 hour (the default) or about 1.5 hours to live to that country's life expectancy. At 1 hour a year passes in about 40 to 60 seconds. You can pause or speed up to 16× while you live, and if you close the window you can continue in the same browser. With 'Auto mode' on, decisions are made for you as well. In a 40-minute lesson, live to ten to fifteen and stop there, or use the lab, which shows many lives at once.

Which devices work? School tablets and Chromebooks?

Yes. It opens in the browser with nothing to install: Chromebooks, iPads and Android tablets, phones and computers with Chrome, Safari, Edge or Firefox, and iPads on iOS 15 too. If the school network blocks it, ask for 1in8b.me to be allowed. One device each is best, but two or three pupils sharing a screen and talking over the decisions works well too.

How does classroom mode stay on?

Classroom mode is saved in this browser only. In another browser or a private window, open the classroom address again. Once opened, the browser opens in classroom mode next time too. In a browser that clears everything when closed, such as a guest window, open it again each lesson.

How do I turn it off?

On the teacher's screen, tap 'Usual screen' beside 'Classroom' at the top. Opening the address with ?edu=0 at the end does the same. The pupils' screen has no such button, so pupils do not leave it on their own. If you tried the pupils' screen on your device, 'Open in classroom mode' on this page brings back the teacher's screen.

What if a pupil's life ends early?

Because it follows the real statistics, some lives end young: in the world, 37 in 1,000 children die before they turn five (UN IGME, 2023). When a life ends before 15, 'Why did this life end so early?' opens the record: how it ended, for a death before five the country's and the world's rates, what prevents such deaths, and a question to think over together. 'Be born again' below it starts a new life. It helps to tell the class beforehand that this can happen.

Can pupils share the lives they lived?

No. In classroom mode posting to shared lives, reading strangers' words, social sharing and memorials are all off. A finished life's card can be saved as a picture on the device, for a presentation or a worksheet.

Does it cost anything? Do pupils sign up?

No. It is free from start to end, with no sign-up, no ads and nothing to install. Classroom mode shows no payment either.

Contact

The feedback form is off in classroom mode. Questions, things to fix and wishes from your lessons are welcome at [email protected]; we read every one. Please leave out anything that identifies a pupil, such as names or the school.