I am working to improve Hockerton Housing Project’s educational programme and have come across a useful collection of teaching resources in a publicly open Google Docs folder. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1RIdW5qi_Rddp9T77V6yd8kjWIL65-WIoVTEnK4UsPiI/mobilebasic

In this folder there are a 14 climate change related lesson plans that will encourage students to think more sustainably. I have summarised these lesson plans so that they can be easily used for teaching purposes when school groups make site-visits to Hockerton Housing Project. For example:

Lesson 2 – Donald Trump Climate Quotes and Climate Denial

Summary:

• Fake News or ‘What Donald Trump Said’ activity – great activity about 15-20 mins long
• BBC News article on psychology of climate change denial. Students need to read this and complete an activity sheet asking them to summarise the article.

Google Docs Outline:

1. Starter: Trump or Fake News – Show students the quotes from Donald Trump relating to climate change. Ask the students to decide whether the quote is ‘Trump’ or ‘Fake News’. Use the information sheet to elaborate on the meaning of his words. Ask students their opinion of Trump’s attitude? Should he be allowed to have these views?
2. Scientific Consensus – Why does Climate Denial still exist? Explain the animated graph showing temperature models for a variety of organisations around the world all showing a similar trend. 98% of scientific evidence suggests recent climate change is manmade. Is there still a debate?
3. News Article – Brain Biases. Direct students to read the BBC news article. Using the worksheet students should read and then reread, pulling out different pieces of information as they go.
4. What’s the main reason for our inaction? – Students should rank the suggested factors and in pairs, develop reasons for why they think this might be the most powerful factor.

Open the document below too see my summary of all 14 lesson plans.

Liam Cox