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Tidetalk~ journal … Feature article
| Climate change ~ local and global An enquiry approach |
Tide~ global learning |
1. Climate change ~ the challenge
Climate change is a big issue for us all, influencing every aspect of our lives. Its complexity demands creativity and debate in order for us as individuals and professionals to begin to make sense of the issues. There are no easy answers and no absolute certainties; the issues will change and develop over time. The decisions young people will be faced with in their adult lives will be very different from those we are faced with now.
As teachers, this may be an uncomfortable place to be – it is difficult to be climate change experts! So the core challenge for teachers as we see it, is to create space for thinking and discussion in which both teachers and learners have the opportunity to investigate ideas, challenge their own thinking and draw their own conclusions.
| 2. Why an enquiry approach? The groups who worked towards the publication ‘Climate Change~ local and global’, focussed on an enquiry approach with their groups of learners at Key Stages 2 and 3. This approach engaged young people positively with the complexities of climate change, encouraging them to draw their own conclusions. It was based on four key questions:
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3. The enquiry process
This section follows the cycle of four questions proposed in Section 2 and offers a selection of activities for supporting the enquiry process.
The activities were developed in response to specific school contexts, but hopefully you will find them useful as a stimulus for your own thinking, practice and debates. We also outline some supporting material and articles that we have found helpful.
Ideas in this section allow children to share their existing ideas and understandings. Activities include opportunities to explore vocabulary, fact and opinion in news articles and graphical information.
This section offers children time and space to think through the implications of climate change for their lives. It is an opportunity to explore negative and positive consequences at a range of scales, exploring personal local and global implications.Activities offer opportunities for children to consider what climate change means for themselves and their communities and to explore negative and positive implications of change.
This section engages learners in making decisions about appropriate actions for themselves, rather than simply conforming to prescribed behaviours. In supporting both action and ideas, teacher groups have stressed the importance of children having opportunities for critical engagement with the issues.Activities in this section include opportunities for learners to consider what action is both appropriate and possible as a response to climate change.
Creating space for young people to reflect upon their learning is a crucial element in the enquiry process – it involves learning about learning. Reviewing understandings will help to develop their resilience to future developments. The activities suggested here include practical, interactive strategies to enable children to think about their own learning, including through sharing that learning with a wider audience.
4. Educational policy context
We are faced with many policy changes and new initiatives which have significant implications for us as teachers. We feel that, despite the pressure for change and innovation, we can be optimistic about the opportunities these changes offer for us to develop a more creative, responsive, learner-centred experience in our schools. This section highlights some significant developments.
5. Resources and links
As the profile and urgency of climate change has increased, there has been a noticeable increase in the number of teaching and learning materials available relating to climate change. We need to critically analyse these resources to ensure that they are helping us to make the most of every learning opportunity. Some resources are blatantly manipulative, aimed at generating specific behaviours rather than encouraging us to consider the nature of our own responses.
There are, however, many really useful resources and websites, some of which we have included as links throughout this article.
Here we highlight more resources that we have found useful.
6. Acknowledgements
Many teachers and groups working with Tide~ in the West Midlands have been involved in responding creatively to climate change in their teaching. We would like to thank them for all of their enthusiasm and hard work.
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