Examining Middle School Students' Thinking on Climate Change: An Earth History Perspective From a Maryland and Delaware Climate Change Education, Assessment and Research (MADE CLEAR) Classroom

• In Event: Enacting Systemic Climate Change Education: Maryland and Delaware Climate Change Education, Assessment and Research (MADE CLEAR) Research and Practice for a Changing Planet

Abstract

For the first time, climate change is included in benchmark standards for K-12 science education in the U.S. (NGSS Lead States, 2013). Research, however, indicates that learning about climate change is conceptually challenging for students and that teachers are ill-prepared to teach about the science and implications of climate change with their students (Johnson et al., 2008). The purpose of this work is twofold. First, we examine how a sixth grade teacher who attended the MADE CLEAR professional development Academy integrated climate change into her existing instruction on Earth’s history and geologic time scale. Subsequently, we investigate the impact of such integration on students’ reasoning regarding the mechanisms of climate change.

Data were collected from classroom observations of the 6-day unit and a pre/post instruction interview with the teacher. To examine student outcomes we developed a content knowledge assessment around four key constructs of climate change: greenhouse effect mechanism, impacts of human activity, local and global effects, and mitigation and adaptation efforts. The assessment was developed in collaboration with climate and learning scientists and included 18 multiple-choice items, representing different levels of achievement consistent with a learning progressions theoretical framework, accompanied by a prompt that asked students to explain their choice. It was administered to students (N=42) both before and after the implementation of the unit. In this presentation we discuss the teacher’s observed instruction and the changes in students’ reasoning on climate change constructs as demonstrated by the assessment instrument.

Results indicated that the unit focused primarily on investigating changes in CO2 levels over vast periods of times (10,000 years or more) and more recently since the industrial revolution. Assessment data indicated that students improved their understanding of the greenhouse effect mechanisms (Mpre=.381, SD=.260, Mpost=.536, SD=.274, t(41)=2.623, p=.012). Further, they were able to more clearly articulate how this mechanism led to global temperature changes. However students still did not provide lengthy explanations for this mechanism. Results for the human activity construct also indicated that students increased their accuracy on the assessment and were able to demonstrate developing understandings of the relationship between human activity and climate change (Mpre=.488, SD=.222, Mpost=.607, SD=.211, t(41)=3.941, p<.001). These developments correspond to the instructional emphasis of Earth’s history and changing atmospheric CO2 levels. No significant changes were observed for the other climate change constructs (mitigation/adaptation and climate change effects). Yet, students did substantially move away from the common misconception of connecting ozone depletion to anthropogenically-enhanced greenhouse effect.

This study illustrates that climate change can be taught in the novel curricular context of Earth’s history as opposed to the more traditional weather and climate perspective. While advancement in student understanding was observed on some constructs, most students were unable to draw connections to the other climate change constructs, which indicates a need to continue to develop instructional units that more fully address all aspects of climate change. These results have significance as educators increasingly seek to integrate climate change in their instruction and align their curricula to the new science standards.

Authors

• Andrea Drewes, University of Delaware

• Chrystalla Mouza, University of Delaware