Abstract

The Climate Toolkit is a resource manual designed to help the reader navigate the complex and perplexing issue of climate change by providing tools and strategies to explore the underlying science. As such it contains a collection of activities that make use of readily available on-line resources developed by research groups and public agencies. These include web-based climate models, climate data archives, interactive atlases, policy papers, and "solution" catalogs. Unlike a standard textbook, it is designed to help readers do their own climate research and devise their own perspective rather than providing them with a script to assimilate and repeat.

With the sudden movement to remote teaching the manual is being revised to function better in this new instructional environment. To that end this presentation is as much invitation as it is "show and tell". The invitation is to participate in this ongoing update by becoming a reviewer. The aim is to complete this update by winter term 2022.

Context

Though originally designed as a text / "lab" manual for a climate science course for undergraduate non-science majors, it is also adapted for a wider audience in non-academic settings like community groups, service organizations, workplace study groups, and faith communities.

Why It Works

The manual is an Open Educational Resources (OER) that is freely available from PDX Scholar (a Portland State University portal for OERs) having a creative commons copyright enabling it to be continuously updated. The latter being a necessity for climate related courses where the body of knowledge is in rapid flux.