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Climate Change Education-are you confident as a teacher and do you think we are making the right steps in education?

By Kate Sutton posted 10-09-2024 09:00

  

This infographic, linking to UNESCO studies (that are current/very recent) highlights the preparedness (or lack of) across various countries and the feeling amongst teachers, relating to delivering Climate Change education in the classroom. It makes for interesting- and worrying- reading. Actions are on the horizon in the UK, including the 'Sustainability and Climate Change' white paper 2023 and increasing support from industry and business. What is your opinion? Are you seeing Climate change education in school and do you feel we are preparing our future adults for the climate challenge ahead?

Click on the link to access the referenced article (Teacher Magazine-Hughes, 24) and share your thoughts-

https://www.teachermagazine.com/au_en/articles/infographic-climate-change-education-around-the-world?utm_source=CM&utm_medium=Bulletin&utm_campaign=20August

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Kate Sutton
19 days ago

Thanks again for your comments. It is so vital that our children are armed for the future and that we start implementing CPD- such a shame that the take up doesn't appear to be there yet. I'm sure it certainly will be going forward and hopefully sooner rather than later.

Annabel Hindmarsh
27 days ago

Shocked that Oceania have not made this a priority! It's going to affect them sooner than most - I mean I realise they are SEEING it more than most populations, but they need to be taught what has caused it & what can be done to halt/reverse it. 

Kate Sutton
12-09-2024 15:56

Thank you for your responses- and the link to resources. It does seem that, for such a huge topic, the impetus has not trickled down to the classroom in a lot of places. It will be very interesting to see what the new government does in response to this challenge to society/ area of the curriculum.

Maggie Beggs
11-09-2024 11:09

The help to keep teachers informed and give them confidence to teach about climate change is out there. STEM learning have a course 'integrating Climate into the curriculum' but my (sadly departed) SLP asked me to deliver it and tried on numerous occasions and couldn't recruit. I wrote an online version with the course reduced to two twilights with a gap taskand concentrating on KS3 and KS4 science, not whole school. Once again didn't recruit. The course included practical work and up to date information as well as research showing the importance of context based education and arguing that Climate Change is a great context for teaching much of the curriculum. I agree with the other comments the problem is time and a willingness to consider the whole school curriulum. It is even hard to get an intergrated collaboartive apporach within the sciences when people are overwhelmed by the day to day pressures. Maybe the review of the curriculum will see an opportunity while parts have to be reviewed and rewritten. 

Michael Jones
11-09-2024 09:38

Hi Linda and Kate. Yep, pretty much the picture out there. Most schools are not aware/not looking at the requirement for a Sustainability Lead in 2025.

If of use, I've recently completed a 10 lesson unit of work using the UN SDG 14 Life Below Water as a pivot to investigate plastics pollution. 

If the unit is of use to people, please do feel free to adapt and deliver - no charge but please keep to educational use.

The files are in a downloadable Google Drive  folder here

The teacher handbook for the unit is here

Although it is 10 lessons, it does split into 3 sections to ease curriculum pressure.

Linda Crouch
11-09-2024 08:00

As ever, time is the issue - a lack of time to discuss and work collaboratively across the whole school to ensure there is a coherent approach to climate change education. However we are looking at asking our 6th form students to 'teach the teacher' - https://www.greenschoolsrevolution.uk/teach-the-teacher/about

I am hoping that this will increase staff awareness of the need to explicitly teach climate change, amongst our other daily priorities.