But What About Climate Change?
But What About Climate Change?
By Meg Edstrom Jones, Director of Educational Partnerships at The Ecology School
We are often asked how we teach about climate change at The Ecology School. Climate change science and awareness needs to be a critical piece of every elementary, middle, and high school students’ education and, for an organization like ours, it is often assumed we will be including in our overnight and outreach programs.
And we do. But probably not in the way most teachers would think of as a way to check it off their list of learning topics. There are no graphs, there are no videos, there is no doom and gloom at River Bend Farm. We address Climate Change by focusing on connecting to our natural and human systems, understanding how our choices and decisions may impact those systems, and addressing what factors are in our control to change. In the end, we build empathy and practice scientific skills with focus on science.
The Ecology School believes the following nine programing goals build a strong context for students to understand and address the issue of Climate Change.
1) We teach systems thinking. Our participants learn to recognize all the parts of a system (in particular ecosystems and our human community systems) and how these work together, how the parts interact, and what impacts those parts have on each other.
2) We build empathy. By engaging students in outdoor explorations, our students make connections to the places they are exploring and the organisms they are discovering. Our students gain the skills to be stewards of the places they inhabit by immersing in a full sensory experience, and by learning how they are an integral part of that system. Students develop their Social and Emotional Learning by building confidence, learning to engage with each other, practicing problem solving, cooperating with peers, and exploring their independence.
3) We observe cycles and changes in nature. Things happen over and over again in cycles such as seasons, the water cycle, tides, and the only constant thing about those cycles are that changes happen during them. Our students learn the steps of these cycles, and how the factors involved change over time. When new or conflicting factors are introduced to these cycles, our students notice those differences as well.
4) We engage in the scientific process. Our students learn how to make observations, ask questions, design experiments, collect data, draw conclusions, and communicate their findings. In essence, they engage in science (definition below) and practice critical thinking skills.
5) We make connections. At The Ecology School, participants learn that everything is connected. Understanding how climate works and impacts each of us grows from an understanding of how systems work together. As John Muir once wrote, “When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world.”
6) We model practical solutions for a sustainable lifestyle. Through our overnight program model and our Living Building Challenge Campus at River Bend Farm, students live what they are learning: Food Systems, Agroecology, Green Building and Design, Renewable Energy, Community Engagement. We model how to reduce our impact, and how to contribute back to these systems through our Living Community Challenge buildings.
7) We take students outdoors helping them unplug and connect to the natural world and each other. There is no substitute for seeing with your own eyes, holding something in your hands, or just taking a moment to listen. There is no substitute for getting away from screens, having conversations with peers, or stepping outside of your comfort zone. And there is nothing like watching the sun rise, feeling a sea star’s suction feet on your hand, or hearing the spring peeper frogs sing in the springtime.
8) We believe we are helping to create thoughtful citizens who will feel empowered to access scientific information and make positive changes to their life and the world.
We know that our students leave our programs feeling proactive and positive, with a stronger identity and self-aspect as a scientist and a learner, which is an excellent place to approach a more traditional Climate Change science curriculum.
We place an emphasis on hands-on, student-led, outdoor based exploration, discovery, and joy. Much of classroom-based Climate Change curriculum is model-driven, demonstration-based, and unfortunately often draws upon frightening visuals of emaciated polar bears and flooded cities. While certainly there is value from some of those approaches, in our short time with students we get outside, unplugged, and connecting with positive, affirming experiences.
9) We support teachers in providing Climate Change curriculum by sharing classroom-based activities, models, demonstrations, and resources that are better implemented over a longer time, in both an indoor and schoolyard setting, with groups of students who spend an entire year together. We also support teachers by providing their students with experiences that can’t be duplicated in the classroom or school environment.
We are heartened that the interest in climate change education is on the rise, generated by both teachers and students. At The Ecology School, we embrace those critical first steps of building connections and familiarity to the places closest to us, practicing scientific skills with all ages of learners, and engaging in our communities to effect meaningful change. Combining all of these, with climate change data and action, is essential to building a climate literate populace.