Teaching Climate Change and the Environmental Crisis Workshop

Dilys Schoorman, CCEI Chair, Bill Bigelow, and Ray Coleman, Pine Jog Executive Director


by Teresa Crane | Tuesday, Nov 20, 2018

The Learn Green Institute at FAU Pine Jog Environmental Education Center and the department of Curriculum, Culture and Educational Inquiry hosted Teaching Climate Change and the Environmental Crisis Workshop presented by Bill Bigelow, former Oregon high school teacher and curriculum editor of Rethinking Schools magazine. About 30 teachers attended the workshop at FAU Pine Jog to gain insight, ideas, and resources for climate education.

Educators participated in discussions and activities designed to get teachers to teach in a way that teaches students to ask questions. Activities included climate crisis role playing, human impacts of climate change poetry activity, and discussions around textbooks dealing with climate change.   

Bigelow said he wants to help teachers give students "a sense that they're not spectators to the future" through activities that encourage creativity and curiosity about the changing climate. He wants teachers and students alike to focus on responding to climate change -- not sitting aside or assigning blame.

Sea-level rise, rising heat, and blue-green algae blooms make teaching climate change in Florida is a timely, meaningful topic.

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