STEAM4Climate - STEAM Education to raise awareness about Climate Change challenges and prepare learners to become true agents of change

Description

Climate Crisis is recognized as an existential threat to humanity by the scientific community and international organizations like EU, UN, or UNESCO. Despite attracting considerable media and political attention, and with a significant citizen movement advocating for action, there is still no comprehensive Climate Education curriculum.

Existing Open Education Resources dedicated to this topic often take a traditional form, with a heavy reliance on text, complicated plots, videos, and infographics, resulting in passive transmission of knowledge from teacher to learner. Furthermore, the topics covered are rarely versatile, failing to provide an approachable yet comprehensive overview of the complicated issue of the climate crisis.

Instead, some teachers discuss only their part of the problem during subject lessons, neglecting to convey the connection and interplay between natural and social sciences. This interdisciplinary approach ranges from understanding the physics of the greenhouse effect to the dependence on biodiversity in biology, the psychology behind denial, and the socio-economic challenges of energy transformation.

Without a comprehensive approach, students may be left with simple but misleading answers, missing the big picture. For example, they may not consider the consequences of swapping a diesel car for an electric one if electricity production still relies on fossil fuels or the ethical issues surrounding the mining of rare earth elements in Africa by children.

To foster a rational and science-based worldview and prevent greenwashing, we aim to address this gap by reviewing existing curricula and creating project-based activities that apply active pedagogy techniques to the field of climate education.

We stress the interdisciplinary nature of the problem, from the physics and chemistry of the greenhouse effect to the socio-economic challenges and the interplay of ecosystems globally. Project-based activities are the method of choice to address such complexity, with an emphasis on STEAM subjects.

While there has been sufficient attention and coverage regarding the problem and its consequences, there remains a lack of focus on addressing solutions. We aim to inform people, especially young individuals on the brink of important decisions in their lives, on how they can be part of the change.

We want them not only to understand the problem but also to act accordingly and be aware in their lives. Furthermore, we seek to encourage at least some of them to pursue careers in STEAM to tackle the Climate Crisis in the future.