This week’s subject and directed study task focused on climate change, in what I found to be quite a complicated topic. The nuances of negotiating climate policy and how much there is to consider in attempting to find equal footing on a global level was certainly taxing to try and understand in such a short period of time. Nevertheless, I found the session to be crucial in developing my understanding of different perspectives on climate change, and how global and national policy with regards to climate change and cultural adaptation are developed.

Politics and Climate Change

The politics and climate change workshop was interesting, as it encouraged us to consider the subject from circumstances outwith our own. It involved research into our given stance – my group was asked to consider to point of view of an MSP. As I am not a politician, it was enlightening to read about the factors they would have to consider, not just in terms of implementing and developing policy, but on maintaining their position in order to be able to do so. It also enabled me to better understand why perceived changes in national attitudes to climate change and action to mitigate it seem to take so long, when you consider how many different parties need to be on board, accommodating and adapting to new policies and approaches. The reading of Staying On Track From Paris: Advancing The Key Elements Of The Paris Agreement (2016) was also useful in terms of highlighting the scope of what must be considered on a global level, as well as highlighting the main areas of focus in climate change policy.

This task also encouraged me to consider how I will teach climate change – I believe it is important to stress that while it exists, opinions on the cause and how best to approach it differ. If, through our teaching, we can encourage and nurture critical thought and analysis in our students, I believe we can set them on a path where they are able to parse through the available information, and reach their own conclusions and courses of action. At a primary level of course, it is crucial that we begin to develop these skills in children – not to the degree that we were expected to reach in our workshops, but facilitating discussion and sharing of opinions will sow the seeds of what will become developed critical analysis skills in time.

Science Skills

I particularly enjoy our practical sessions in this module. I find them to be fun, engaging, and crucially for me, useful in terms of expanding my understanding of how to teach and engage my future students.

The importance of making concepts visible for children was highlighted again in these sessions. Science is a fantastically engaging subject when presented properly, and the practical element of our activities seem to me to be an excellent way to encourage children to take an interest in it. Presenting climate change through activities such as those we carried out, I think, makes concepts real to children, enabling them to relate small-scale experiments to their learning about concepts at large.

The biome activity was particularly interesting for me as a research activity. In our groups we were given a biome and placed in a situation where we had crashed with a limited amount of resources. The focus on the activity was learning about the biome we were given and coming up with solutions as to how we would survive the terrain. While I would not use an exact version of this in a primary 5 class, as it was quite extensive, a pared-down version would be a great group activity for a class.

I also found the experiments using water engaging and fun, something I would definitely use with a class. The first experiment involved a tank of room temperature water, and two cups – one with warm water and one with refrigerated water. Food colouring was added to each cup to represent warm (red) and cold (blue) air. At the same time, both cups were dropped into the tank, and we were able to observe as the warm and cold fronts interacted. Using this experiment with a class would provide a good opportunity for class discussion, finding out what the children already know, and using questioning to develop higher order thinking skills.

The second water experiment involved a lidded jar of water, containing a few drops of detergent and food colouring. Visualising the water as air, the jar was shaken to produce a “tornado”, demonstrating how actual tornadoes are formed in the air. Again, this would provide a good opportunity for class discussion and higher order thinking skills.

When teaching climate change, we were advised to focus on weather, as it is a tangible aspect of the subject that children can engage with. To that effect, these experiments would be ideal to use to support learning, and could form the basis of a fact-file or ongoing project in the subject of climate change. It would also tie in with other aspects of learning for sustainability – learning why we have eco-schools and what we aim to accomplish from them, changes we can make in our lifestyles and asking why they are necessary. An important part of teaching this subject for me is not simply teaching facts and information, I aim to teach in such a way that fosters an inquisitive and involved approach to science and sustainability.

Directed Study Task

The directed study tasks was enlightening and thought-provoking, in terms of encouraging me to consider my own behaviour and impact on the environment. Since moving to Ayr I have been more proactive in some changes such as how I travel, but I can always afford to make further changes in other areas of my life. I don’t believe that living in an environmentally-friendly is necessarily difficult, perhaps just that the changes that need to be made in order to do so are not always immediately apparent, and perhaps require some consideration.

As I mentioned in my directed study post, there are small changes I could make which would lend themselves to more environmentally friendly behaviour, such as changing my eating habits, being more proactive in recycling, and generally becoming more conscious of the impact that my actions can have. There may be further changes I could make, but I consider these as reasonable stepping stones on the way to more environmentally-friendly behaviour.

In terms of my teaching, my main consideration from these tasks is that I present information to children in a way that encourages them to be open-minded and ask questions about these subjects, while facilitating discussion and development of higher order thinking skills.  Science as a curricular area is ideal for developing these skills, and teaching them through experiments in weather would make the learning relevant, tangible and the knowledge gained transferable to further learning.

 

References

Staying On Track From Paris: Advancing The Key Elements Of The Paris Agreement. (2016). World Resources Institute.