A blog post, titled ‘Climate education – global change through local action’ by Dr. Nasreen Majid (Associate Professor of Education, University of Reading), has just been released on the University’s research blog.
The blog post highlights the University of Reading’s Climate Education Summit and what it has achieved to build momentum for Climate Education in England. The blog post also discusses the importance of working collaboratively to support the development of climate education across all aspects of life. The blog post was published on UNESCO’s International Day of Education. The theme for this year was ’Changing Courses’ Transforming Education’. The day set out to highlight the need to embed climate education in school globally. Therefore, to achieve this we must take local action to achieve the ambitious global change. This includes embedding climate education within all Initial Teacher Training courses, as set out in the National Climate Action Plan.
The blog post also shares Dr. Majid’s research findings which collected and analysed survey data from 75 participants, 43 of these were primary age pupils and 32 primary teachers from England. The findings suggest how pupils feel anxious about the climate crisis and experience eco-anxiety. However, on a positive note the findings also showed individual actions that pupils suggested they could take to be more sustainable. Some examples of these were: Plant more trees recycling, meat free Mondays, walk to school. Similarly, teachers shared their frustration of not having adequate time to fit this important aspect of learning into their day. Although they demonstrated that they gained information about climate change through personal research, they wanted more structured, school-based opportunities for professional learning in this area. (Dr. Majid is currently in the final stages of preparing her research article before being sent for review.)
Moreover, Dr. Majid and Professor Andrew Charlton- Perez also recently discussed Climate Education and the work the University of Reading is undertaking in the area with the Times Educational Supplement. You can view the article here.
You can find more about her research interests here. She tweets at @DrMajid_nasreen.