Teaching Sequence

Work through this resource in the following sequence:

15 minutes

Tune In: Reading the headlines on climate change

20 minutes

Find Out: 20 truths about climate change

20+ minutes

Take Action: Telling the truth about climate change

5 minutes

Reflection

Tune In: Reading the headlines on climate change

Step 1

Share the following online newspaper headlines with students. You could project them onto the board and invite students to read them individually. Or you could print and cut out each headline, giving each student one headline and inviting them to move around the classroom and share and discuss their headlines with their classmates.

Note: These headlines were all published in late 2023 or early 2024; you could add some more recent or locally relevant headlines of your own.

Step 2

Once complete, pose the following question:

What do these headlines tell us about climate change?

Suggested answer: they mention bushfires, hurricanes, melting glaciers and human impacts. Overall, they indicate that climate change could impact many different parts and places in our world.

What kind of language is used in these headlines? Is it optimistic or pessimistic? Is it calming or alarming?

Suggested answer: They are pretty alarming, with terms like ‘unsafe world’, ‘ripped’ and ‘threat’.

Could there be another way to present these headlines that is less alarming and more calming?

Suggested answer: Using more hopeful language is one idea. In the case of these headlines, hopeful language could mean suggesting there are solutions, that the outcome isn’t fixed, and that people are working on these issues.

Do any of the headlines include hopeful language?

Suggested answer: Generally speaking, news headlines are made to catch our attention, and news editors look for headlines that grab the eye; scary headlines are one strategy for attracting attention. However, the headline on handfish suggests that humans are helping the handfish, and the headline on glaciers suggests that humans are looking for solutions to melting glaciers. Both are these are more hopeful examples.

Step 3

Invite students to consider why the language that we use for something like climate change might be important. Suggest to students that when we feel scared, anxious or upset it’s hard to move out of this space and into a place where we want to take action. And climate change requires all of us to act. So how can we present the facts about climate change in a more hopeful way?

Notes:

Many young people have strong feelings about climate change and can find it upsetting and difficult to discuss, especially when faced with headlines like these. Please reassure students by explaining that many people all around the world are working hard to meet the challenges posed by climate change and that those websites where these articles are sourced also include stories of these people and the great work that is also being done, and indeed, many of the stories attached to these headlines include those people.
An important part of talking about this topic is first to acknowledge the challenging bits and allow students time to talk about these issues. In this way, students are more likely to feel like their concerns about these issues are real, and that school is a good place to explore them. As a result, students are more likely to feel supported and be more invested in their learning. See the Talking About Climate Change fact sheet for more information.

Find Out: 20 truths about climate change

Step 1

Share the 20 Truths About Climate Change with students.

Step 2

Pose the question:

Are there any truths that are unclear or that need clarification?

Invite students to suggest any questions or topics relating to climate change that are unclear to them. Divide these questions or topics amongst pairs or small groups of students and ask them to conduct research online to address these points. Students can report back to the class. Where relevant, the Climate Change Fact Sheet could be used in addition to other fact sheets available at Cool.org.

Take Action: Telling the truth about climate change

Step 1

Students can now select a climate truth and use the truth to create one of the following activities (students could choose their own or the teacher can assign an activity based on student ability and time available).

As students create their own texts, where possible encourage them to choose language that is hopeful, optimistic, humourous or calming. Yes, many of the truths are challenging and confronting, but they can be reframed and reworded: While the truths are serious, they don’t need to be scary.

Suggested activities:

Rewrite a truth as a hopeful news headline. You might need to do some more research to find out some of the solutions or for examples of human action.
Dig into one truth in more detail and conduct some research into this truth. You can then rewrite the truth as a longer informative paragraph (including references)
Think of a fact about climate change that you’ve heard anecdotally or on social media (e.g. the ‘climate isn’t really changing’ or ‘we’ve always had floods and fires in Australia’). If you can’t think of any, look some up online (e.g. search for myths about climate change and focus only on the headings). Answer these questions: Which of the ‘truths’ would you use to interrogate this anecdotal fact? Do you need more information to support you in understanding more about this fact? Where could you get this information, and what types of sources would you look for (provide examples and justify?
Create a short story based on a truth and illustrate your story
Rewrite a truth as fake news. Think about the type of language you would use for fake news: Would it be calming or alarming? Would it be hopeful? Be prepared to explain your choices.
Rewrite one truth in a way that could be understood by a 6-year-old. Carefully consider the language you use (you don’t want to scare the 6-year-old) by choosing calming words rather than alarming words
Create your own truth based on your own imagination. The teacher can read these out to the class, and the class can vote on the most believable ‘truth’
Rewrite one of the truths using hopeful language. Then use an AI tool to also rewrite this truth using hopeful language. How do they compare?

Note: The teacher should set the word limit and sentence count for students. This could be based on time available or differentiated learning needs.

Students could then choose a different truth, and use it as the basis for a different activity. You can repeat as many times as you like with students choosing different truths and different activities each time.

Step 2

Provide an opportunity for students to share their work with others, either by sharing with a classmate for comparison and discussion or by presenting their work to the class.

Reflection

Students respond to the following question through class discussion:

Why do you think hopeful language is important for taking action on climate change?

Exploring The Truth About Climate Change

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Summary

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