Supporting Elementary Educators’ Climate Change Learning through a Teacher Book Club

• In Event: Teacher Education for Transdisciplinary Climate Change Education

Abstract

Climate change is a complex topic that requires transdisciplinary understandings. For example, in addition to understanding the scientific phenomena involved in global warming, it is necessary to examine how human activity drives climate change, how systems like capitalism and industrialization have exacerbated it, and inequitable impacts on different people. In K-12 schools, while we tend to teach science, social studies, literature, and the arts through separate curriculum and in isolated time blocks, they are/must be profoundly interconnected in climate change education.

Elementary contexts, while not the typical focus of climate change education, are ideal for transdisciplinary instruction because one educator typically teaches across disciplines and can support integrated exploration and inquiry across the school day. However, because elementary teachers don’t tend to know as much about climate change as specialized science teachers, we have found a need to design spaces in which practicing elementary educators can deepen their knowledge about climate change and develop practical ideas for teaching about it. Thus, we led a yearlong book club with elementary educators to support their learning about climate change. We ask: How does participation in a teacher book club support elementary teachers’ transdisciplinary understandings about climate change?

The use of book clubs to support teacher learning is well documented, and has been shown to provide teachers with opportunities to engage in reflective practice and collegial dialogue, and to explore teaching-related issues in a relatively low-stakes environment. Literature notes positive experiences for participants as well as opportunities for knowledge-building.
The study was situated in a virtual book club consisting of eight meetings. Participants included four elementary teachers and two literacy teacher educators. We read and discussed All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis (Johnson & Wilkinson, 2020), an anthology of essays from women across the United States who are leading the climate movement. Sessions were augmented with various activities to support participants to develop climate change pedagogy (e.g., reading picturebooks, engaging in prompted reflections, composing and doing art to make and communicate meaning about climate change). Data collected included meeting transcripts, participants' reflections, and interviews. Guided by our research question, we analyzed the data inductively through multiple cycles to identify themes. Examples of codes include: scientific knowledge; social knowledge; book knowledge; diverse perspectives; inclusion/exclusion; agency; pedagogical application; tension; emotion/feeling; and composing/art.

We organize and present these codes into three themes that share how this book club, through these kinds of activities, helped elementary teachers to: (1) build knowledge about the complexity of climate change, including both natural and social dimensions; (2) expand their knowledge of children’s literature that can foster understandings of climate change; and (3) recognize the importance of centering diverse perspectives in climate change education. After sharing concrete examples from this book club, we give practical advice--including kinds of activities that can support teacher climate change book clubs-- for teacher educators seeking to support transdisciplinary learning, climate change book clubs, and climate change pedagogies.

Authors

• Rebecca Woodard, University of Illinois at Chicago

• Kristine M. Schutz, University of Illinois at Chicago