Tackling Climate Education with Community-Based Learning
The Climate Initiative Partners with CK-12
At The Climate Initiative (TCI), we created Learning Labs to bridge the gap between learning and real-life local issues. We provide instructional connections encouraging local exploration and community participation through interviews and conversations, culminating in action projects. Learning Lab modules, the first of which is now available as a CK-12 FlexBook®, enable youth to lead their communities by acting locally while thinking globally.
Act locally while thinking globally.
Climate change is an overwhelming topic with complex worldwide implications. Though students learn about this challenge in classes, from the news, and on social media, many are left overwhelmed, sad, angry, and frustrated, and they feel paralyzed that there is nothing they can do to affect change in this generation’s most pressing crisis.
Local communities are witnessing ever-increasing changes as we face more severe weather, wildfires, warming oceans, and evolving habitats. We know from scientists that this decade will be paramount in addressing our changing climate before it is too late. We are already starting to see the impact locally of the crisis we are facing globally. Yet, we struggle to talk about what is happening. We feel powerless to make the changes necessary to alter our trajectory.
How do we as educators help our students and our communities figure out how to save what we love and value before it is too late?
We know that by engaging communities locally and connecting students and their families with what they love and value, we can offer meaningful learning opportunities and grow movements. Community-based education gives students problem-solving skills in real-life applications. Addressing issues students face in the places they live gives them agency and an ability to see that they can be a part of the solution to a problem that seems intangible on a global scale.
We recognize that all voices are necessary, and youth voices in the climate movement are powerful. Community members know the town’s natural and cultural history and can pass that knowledge on to the students. Engaging all voices provides a unique opportunity to start conversations about climate change science without leaving people hopeless. Instead, we leave them connected and ready to take action.
TCI Learning Labs & CK-12
TCI Learning Lab modules are designed to be used online or in-person, and by putting our modules on CK-12, we’re creating FlexBooks that speak directly to the student. We want students to feel that they are in the driver’s seat, even as teachers can assign the module individually or use it in the classroom. Concentrating on one topic makes it easier for students and teachers to find a local connection to a global problem. Whether their community is plagued by invasive species or students are looking to increase the renewable sources of energy for their school or town buildings, there is a topic that students can relate to their local landscape and what they know.
The pandemic made the education world pivot and learn how to be nimble; it also resulted in some feelings of isolation. In this new world, having opportunities to do community-based learning online is imperative. We feel that the online format of our Learning Lab FlexBooks allows for that same agile online interactive education to continue but also encourages community interaction and getting out into the natural world.
We look forward to continuing our work with CK-12 and encourage students and teachers to check out the first in our series of TCI Climate Science FlexBooks, Invasive Species, and keep an eye out for our next one on renewable energy!
Written by Leia Lowery, Director of Programs and Outreach at The Climate Initiative
Edited by Katie Hamon, CK-12 Foundation
Fall 2023 Update: Since this post, The Climate Initiative has published three more TCI Climate Science FlexBooks: Renewable Energy with En-ROADS; Climate Justice and Equity; and Floods, Droughts, and Wildfires
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Note: The views expressed in this article are that of the guest author and do not necessarily reflect those of the CK-12 Foundation.
