Children and youth know that climate change is altering lives, environmental patterns and futures.
Human-caused climate change is altering the intensity of the likelihood of extreme weather, and has , creating significant personal and economic costs. In 2021, , including devastating flooding, landslides, heat domes, wildfires, thawing permafrost and hurricanes.
We have examined existing research about understanding . Our focus is learning how to best equip young people to navigate climate change and to envision their futures amid multiple social challenges.
While the effects of climate change are undeniable across global communities, these effects also people who .
Our early research findings have identified the importance of moving beyond traditional curricular approaches in schools.
We hope to help develop innovative ways to teach children and youth about climate change in a way that is trauma-informed . This includes linking scientific approaches with arts-based methods.
We have also begun a process of interviewing British Columbia educators and reviewing the province’s curriculum to assess how B.C. is doing with regards to best practices in climate change education, and what might be improved.
Intergenerational justice issue
Climate change is a social and intergenerational justice issue that disproportionately impacts children and youth, who .
Youth and children also have unique needs in climate adaptation, mitigation and recovery processes, given the . , but are often not given the opportunity — and when they do act, their efforts can go unnoticed.
When young people perceive that adults are not taking substantial action on climate change and when their voices go unheard, these experiences can contribute to . This is particularly the case in a media-saturated world where reminders of climate disasters, , are permeating the news, social media and the social environment around them.
The impacts of climate change, as well as youth and children’s reaction to them, serve as continuous reminders for , parents or guardians, regional planners and that climate change is an urgent issue requiring immediate attention. How we communicate about climate change and imagine possible social responses to this shared crisis has a lasting effect on children and youth today.
Need for ‘grounded hope’
For their development and well-being, children need .
Building on the thinking of psychologist Lee Daniel Kravetz, we think this could be called offering . With respect to climate change, this approach would encourage young people to learn how to identify and connect with the strengths and assets of their communities and to develop tools for envisioning and building sustainable solutions.
This agency can . An important way to foster this agency is through linking scientific approaches with arts-based methods. For children and youth, is affecting their lives and sense of future, but also a creative way to develop new metaphors, narratives and design principles for building a more hopeful future.
Responses to climate change
Youth have varied reactions to the effects of the climate crisis on their future. These reactions include having that negatively affect sleep, ability to focus and relationships; feeling like the future is out of their hands, leading to reduced priority of planning for the future (such as considering further education) or expressing to address climate change.
and stay connected to each other in a kind and compassionate way. Paying attention to both is critical when the going gets tough.
Trauma-informed approaches
Beyond stress, some children and youth find the effects of climate change are traumatic. The Manitoba Trauma Information Centre defines trauma as “a single experience, or enduring repeated or multiple experiences, that .” Research shows that when talking to young people about climate change, that builds resilience is helpful.
A B.C. Ministry of Education document offering key principles and strategies promoting mental health in schools notes that taking a trauma-informed lens means “.”
From curriculum guidelines to teaching approaches, schools must seek to operate out of an awareness of the historically and culturally specific ways that students are vulnerable to both climate trauma and other forms of trauma resulting from intersecting forms of injustice and marginalization.
Life chances
The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the ways in which severe and sustained changes to children’s social world via, prolonged and , for example, may alter children’s development, prospects for educational attainment — chances people have for “sharing in the ,” as explained by sociologist Anthony Giddens.
Extreme-weather events create the possibility for similar personal and social upheaval, along with significant impacts to the natural environment, communities and built infrastructure. However, involving children meaningfully (in age- and stage-appropriate ways) in making change can promote feelings of agency and resilience in the age of the climate crisis.
We look forward to continuing to understand specific ways educators, parents and role models are teaching about climate change in resilience-building ways, and what insights this may yield for future directions for climate change education.
Maya Gislason receives funding from Michael Smith Health Research BC, SFU's Community Engagement Initiative, and Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council for this work.
Angel M. Kennedy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
