Answer: Get them to watch Big History. Or better still, watch the lecture series together and talk about it afterwards.

What is Big History?

Watch the creator of Big History, David Christian, race through the history of our Universe in this brilliant 17-minute TED video:

Big History is hoped to be available free online by 2013. In the meantime, you can purchase the 48-lecture series in DVD for $520 (or downloadable audio for $250) from The Great Courses.

For more details go to: http://www.thegreatcourses.com/tgc/courses/course_detail.aspx?cid=8050