Activity: Watch the following video as a short introduction to “Barriers to Sustainable Development”
Video 2: Identifying Barriers to Sustainable Behaviors
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aC-KT36tH6s
Activity: Climate Stakeholders – Navigating the Path Between Despair and Empowerment
Adapted from: Climate change in the classroom: UNESCO course for secondary teachers on climate change education for sustainable development. https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000219752
Facilitation Guidance
This activity is designed to help students explore their emotional responses to climate change and to develop strategies for taking action in the face of this challenge. The activity is divided into eight stages:
1. Recalling feelings of power. In this stage, students are asked to recall moments in their lives when they felt powerful. This could be anything from feeling confident in their abilities to feeling a sense of belonging to a community.
2. Experiencing climate change dystopias. In this stage, students are presented with images or videos of climate change dystopias.
3. Experiencing climate change nightmares. These images are designed to evoke feelings of fear, despair, and hopelessness.
4. Reflecting on what they value. In this stage, students are asked to reflect on what they value most in life. This could be anything from their relationships to their sense of purpose.
5. Considering hopeful futures. In this stage, students are asked to imagine a hopeful future for themselves and their planet. This future should be based on their values and their understanding of climate change.
6. Planning individual action. In this stage, students are asked to develop a plan for taking individual action to address climate change. This could include things like reducing their carbon footprint, getting involved in activism, or educating others about climate change.
7. Reflecting on their own power. In this stage, students are asked to reflect on the power they have to make a difference in the face of climate change. This reflection should be based on their experiences in the previous stages of the activity.
8. Concluding comment. In the concluding comment, the facilitator should explain that the purpose of the activity is to help students address the fear, despair, and hopelessness that many people feel in the face of climate change. The facilitator should also emphasize that taking action is essential to addressing this challenge.
This activity is important because it helps students to understand their own emotional responses to climate change and to develop strategies for taking action in the face of this challenge. It is also important because it helps to combat despair, helplessness, and cynicism in young people. By helping students to see that they have the power to make a difference, this activity can help to foster in them the commitment to engage in climate change action.
Have students sit in a large circle. Ask students to think about times when they have had to do something really difficult or scary but where they came out feeling really powerful. Give them a few minutes for reflection before asking them to pick up a card and draw images that capture the experience and feelings of those times. Have students share and explain their images round the circle. Then have them store their card for future reference.
Each student will pick up an empty card. On the card, they will write down three sentences, each sentence starting with one of the following prompts:
1. “The thing that worries me most about the changing climate is…”
2. “The thing I prefer not to think about happening with climate change is…”
3. “What scares me most about a climate-changed world is…”
After three to four minutes, the cards will be collected and shuffled. The cards will then be redistributed. Students will read out the card they have received. No comments will be made on the sentences.
Ask students to quietly imagine dangerous climate change incidents, something they have actually experienced, or something they have read in a newspaper, magazine or book or seen in a film. After a few minutes ask them to draw a picture on paper about these feelings. Don’t show these cards to anyone.
Now ask students to think about something they most value about life or the world and what they would do to protect it. After a few minutes, ask volunteers to share and describe their ideas.
On a new card, have students write three sentences beginning with the following prompts:
1. I really could help my community face up to climate change by…
2. I could show climate change leadership if I…
3. To help transform things, a good way forward for me would be to…
Once more collect in the cards, shuffle them, and hand them out again. Have students read out the card they have received. All sentences are accepted without comment.
After hearing the individual contributions, have the group brainstorm ideas for the big things and little things they could personally do to help combat climate change as students and members of a community.
Big things are more public and noticeable, and are likely to involve others. These could include things like:
• Organizing a school walkout to protest climate change.
• Starting a petition to demand that your city or town adopt more sustainable practices.
• Volunteering with an environmental organization.
Little things are more private and unnoticed, but they can still make a big difference. These could include things like:
• Bringing your own reusable bag to the grocery store.
• Turning off the lights when you leave a room.
• Unplugging appliances when they’re not in use.
Note down all of the ideas on the flip chart or chalkboard.
Ask participants to look back at their images of themselves being powerful (Stage 1). Invite them to quietly reflect on how those feelings of power might be drawn upon in helping combat climate change and, in particular, in acting on the big and little things pooled during Stage 6.
• Invite participants to close their eyes and take a few deep breaths.
• Ask them to recall the images they created in Stage 1 of themselves being powerful.
• Invite them to reflect on how those feelings of power might be drawn upon in helping combat climate change.
• Ask them to think about the big and little things they discussed in Stage 6 that they could do to help combat climate change.
• After a few minutes, invite participants to open their eyes.
Then go round the circle asking students to share their reflections one by one.
• Start by asking one participant to share their reflections.
• After they have shared, ask the other participants if they have any thoughts or questions about what they shared.
• Continue around the circle until everyone has had a chance to share.
Finally, place blank ‘commitment to action’ cards in the centre of the circle and in a few minutes of quiet invite participants to write their own commitment cards.
Close the activity sequence with a concluding comment (see Facilitation Guidance)
Activity: Alternative Pathways for a Sustainable Planet
Adapted from: Climate change in the classroom: UNESCO course for secondary teachers on climate change education for sustainable development. https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000219752
Facilitation Guidance
In encouraging feedback on reports and facilitating group discussion, it is important to consider the realism and practicability of the plans.
• Were the plans naive or overly idealistic?
• Were important considerations overlooked?
• How could the plans be made more workable?
It is also worth discussing the usefulness and feasibility of goal-oriented planning of this nature.
• What are the limitations of such approaches?
• Are they nonetheless useful tools for locating constraints and critical decision points in seeking to achieve a desired goal?
By discussing these questions, participants can gain a better understanding of the challenges and opportunities of goal-oriented planning. They can also develop their own skills in planning and implementing change initiatives.