Teaching Sequence

8 minutes	Preliminary activity and discussion
15 minutes	Worksheet activity
20 minutes	Research and poster creation
5 minutes	Closing discussion

Work through this resource material in the following sequence:

1. Begin this activity by asking each student to write down 10 words that spring to mind when they think of the terms 'climate change' and 'the greenhouse effect'. The words can come from what students already know about the science of this topic, or can reflect an emotive response to this topic.

Ask students to share these words with the class. As they do, add them here to generate a word cloud. Remember to put a comma between each word. Words that appear with higher frequency will appear bigger in the word cloud, so don't worry if students suggest the same word multiple times, as the word cloud will reflect their thinking.

Once complete, hold a brief discussion with your students about the class word cloud. Consider using the following questions:

Which words are the most common in your class?
Why do you think these words are the most common?

2. Ask students to spend 10 minutes exploring the Climate Change Toolbox on the Cool Australia website. Students must read this section on climate change and the Climate change fact sheet. Once these two items have been read, students can spend the rest of the time looking through the other resources.

Once the 10 minutes are up, ask students to create questions using the following question starters based upon what they saw and read in the Toolbox (question starters also available on the Student Worksheet):

How would it be different if…?
Suppose that…?
What are the reasons…?
What if…?
What if we knew…?
What is the purpose of…?
What would change if…?
Why…?

3. Once students have completed their questions, ask them to select one questions that they would like answered. Students should write this question on a piece of paper and hand this paper to the teacher. The teacher should then distribute these questions amongst the class to be answered.

Ask each student to investigate an answer to the question they were given. Students should create a poster that shares the question and describes the answer. Answers should be kept to a maximum of 5 sentences and students can use images in support of their answer.

4. Once all students have completed their posters, display the posters in the classroom and engage students in a discussion around the posters. Consider using the following questions to guide your discussion:

Which types of questions were most popular? Why do you think that is?
What topics were the most popular? Why do you think that is?
Which types of questions/topics were the easiest to answer and why? Which were hardest and why?

Assessment/Reflection

1. Working independently, ask students to create a new word cloud using key words from the questions that students created using the question starters on the Student Worksheet. Students should decide what sorts of words they will include (emotive, scientific, descriptive etc) and should explain why they chose these words.

2. Ask students to reflect on this activity using the PMI chart (available on the Student Worksheet).

Homework

Ask students to investigate the relationship between food and climate change, answering one of the two following questions:

How does food affect climate change?
How will climate change affect food?

Students should imagine they are a teacher who is bringing their chosen question to the classroom. Students should create a 15 minute classroom activity to engage students on this question. The activity should:

Be fun and informative;
Include both independent and group activities;
Include resources required to complete the activity; and
Should include answers to the main question (How does food affect climate change? or How will climate change affect food?) for the teacher to use.

The teacher can choose the best activity and incorporate it into an actual lesson on this topic.

Earth Hour - An Overview of Climate Change

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