Improving Climate Literacy Through your Undergraduate Course

Thursday, April 7, 2016

12:00 pm Pacific | 1:00 pm Mountain | 2:00 pm Central | 3:00 pm Eastern
Presenters: Cindy Shellito (University of Northern Colorado), Julie Bartley (Gustavus Adolphus College), Laura Triplett (Gustavus Adolphus College)

This webinar is part of a series supporting teaching with InTeGrate principles, using InTeGrate-developed and curated materials as tools.

Summary

This webinar will provide an opportunity to hear from geoscience faculty who connect climate literacy to learning about the Earth in their courses (more information on teaching sustainability). Cindy Shellito is the author of the InTeGrate module: Climate of Change and will talk about climate literacy principals and share examples of how to teach about them in a course. Julie Bartley and Laura Triplett are leaders of the Gustavus Adolphus College InTeGrate Implementation Program that works to weave climate science across the curriculum. They will talk about how contextualizing climate literacy principals is important in this work and the role of InTeGrate materials in supporting their efforts. The webinar will include 30 minutes of presentation and 25 minutes for discussion. Participants are encouraged to both ask questions of the presenters and discuss their own experiences connecting climate literacy to their courses.

Goals:

At the end of this webinar, participants will have

• a strategy for increasing climate literacy in their courses
• a link between climate literacy and the focus of their course
• greater familiarity with InTeGrate principles and resources
• new colleagues engaged in this work

Logistics

Time - 12:00 pm Pacific | 1:00 pm Mountain | 2:00 pm Central | 3:00 pm Eastern
Duration - 1 hour
Format - Online web presentation via Adobe Connect web conference software with questions and discussion. To join the webinar, please visit: http://serc.adobeconnect.com/integrate/ and follow the prompts.
Registration - Registration for this webinar has closed.
Preparation - There is no advance preparation required for this webinar.

Please email Alice Newman (anewman AT carleton.edu) if you have any questions about this event.

Presenters

Cindy Shellito, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, University of Northern Colorado

Julie Bartley, Geology, Gustavus Adolphus College

Laura Triplett, Geology, Gustavus Adolphus College

Program

1) Welcome and introductory remarks - Alice Newman, SERC

2) What is climate literacy? - Cindy Shellito

• Brief survey of webinar participants and prompt to consider how they frame climate literacy within their present (or future) courses
• What are climate literacy principles? What types of things do they cover?

3) Intro to first two units of the Climate of Change module – Cindy Shellito

• Unit 1: Forecasting Climate Variability and Change: A Matter of Survival
• Unit 2: Deciphering Short-Term Climate Variability

Q & A

4) Contextualizing climate literacy for your audience - Laura Triplett

About the Gustavus Adolphus College "Climate Across the Curriculum Program"

• How do you contextualize talking about climate?
• How can you frame climate literacy in a way that links to course content?
• How can you make this work at your institution?

5) Examples from "Climate Across the Curriculum" Program

• 'Tragedy of the commons' module for an Economics class – Julie Bartley
• Addresses parts of principles #2, 6 and 7 from the NOAA document
• 'Scientific debate and the nature of certainty' module for a Religion or Philosophy class - Laura Triplett
• Addresses parts of principles #2, 4, 5, 6 and 7 from the NOAA document
• Program transferability and sustainability – Julie Bartley

Q & A

5) Reflection by participants

• Prompt: What opportunities do you see in your situation: your class, department, or college/university?

After reflecting for a moment, please use the chat to share something about where you are in your teaching, how you would move forward, and why this is a strong move. You can also enter questions for discussion into the chat at this time.

6) Synthetic remarks

The conveners will reflect on the chat and each provide a synthetic remark.

7) Thank you and opportunities for further interaction - Alice Newman

8) Webinar evaluation

Resources

• Slideshow for today's webinar: Climate Literacy Webinar slideshow 2016 (PowerPoint 2007 (.pptx) 6.1MB Apr7 16)
• About InTeGrate
• Teaching About Sustainability
• InTeGrate Strategies for Teaching about Science and Sustainability
• Why Link Together Learning about the Earth and Sustainability?
• Strategies for Interdisciplinary Teaching
• InTeGrate Materials Development Process
• InTeGrate: Climate of Change module
• National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Climate Literacy brochure
• Climate Literacy & Energy Awareness Network (CLEAN)
• Resources on Teaching Climate Science
• Climate Science Across the Curriculum at Gustavus Adolphus College
• Teaching activity: Introducing the economic concept of 'tragedy of the commons' using global warming -- Please note that this activity will also be found on the new Gustavus Adolphus program site, which will be updated by December 2016
• List of modules created and implemented at Gustavus (Acrobat (PDF) 156kB Apr6 16) -- Please note that all of these will be available via the updated Gustavus Adolphus program site by December 2016
• Tips and advice for teaching about controversial topics
• For information on the Earth Educators' Rendezvous 2016 and NAGT Traveling Workshops Program, please click icons below: