The rationale, objectives, and social studies units are provided in this curriculum guide for grade 8. Focus is upon students' assessing, hypothesizing, and synthesizing the world's critical problems. Teaching techniques are process education oriented emphasizing inquiry training, problem solving, and inductive learning in an attempt to prepare students to understand and cope with the complexity and challenges of social issues in a rapidly changing world. A set of selected world problems are interrelated, they are separated for organization purposes. The four activity units encourage student participation. I. "The Struggle for Life," attempts to survey problems of hunger, poverty, disease and overpopulation. II. "Urbanization," deals with the world trend toward urban living. III."Cultural Diversity and Intolerance," looks at ethnocentrism and racism throughout the world. IV. "Nationalism," examines this phenomenon as a force that both builds and destroys in today's world. (Author/SJM)