Feeling for Climate: The Case of New Jersey’s Climate Education Curriculum

• In Event: Virtual Roundtable Session 3
  In Refereed Roundtable Session: Roundtable Discussion on Barriers and Potentials in Using Social-Emotional Learning Towards Climate Justice: A View from South Asia

Proposal

The study discusses the importance of Social Emotional Learning in integrating climate education into formal school curricula. More specifically, it uses well-being and happiness as a framework to discuss the importance of Social Emotional Learning in climate education in a comparative perspective. This study found that when integrated with the formal curricula, pluralistic education, education for sustainable development, and positive education contribute to effective climate education. It presents an analysis of core climate ideas that are integrated into New Jersey’s student learning standards. The results show that cognitive skills heavily dominate the climate core ideas. It shows the gap in Social Emotional Learning focus and its linkages to environmental understanding and community action. This case study's results suggest how other systems can introduce such curriculum changes to develop positive emotions about the environment, which is key for learners to have a deeper bond with nature. Such curricula and standards, in systems that emphasize using Social Emotional Learning as a tool to make the emotional connection with the environment, is possible and a must where climate degradation is fastest. The study proposes a rubric that combines literature-driven dimensions of positive education, sustainability, and pluralistic education, which could be used as tools for curriculum design in other systems in other countries, adapted to local cultures.

Author

• Radhika Iyengar, Columbia University, climate School