By Dr Meryl Batchelder, middle school teacher in Northumberland, UK and TeachSDG Ambassador.
To start, let me make a confession. Even though I’ve been a science teacher for well over a decade, until the pandemic I didn’t really embrace educational technology or ‘EdTech’. The curriculum is busy, I was trying to incorporate more environmental education into my lessons and, although I encouraged the use of iPads for data logging or spreadsheets for plotting graphs, I’d never really found much use for educational IT platforms.
A benefit of the pandemic?
When we went into lockdown suddenly I welcomed EdTech, using several online programs to make my virtual sessions interactive, meaningful and engaging. Much as I missed the daily face-to-face interaction with my pupils, I enjoyed the creative aspects of teaching online and observed many benefits for children. It promoted independent learning, provided opportunities for reflection, options for home-based-hands-on projects and also demonstrated that short lessons with lots of interaction could be highly effective. A kind of edutainment – where the educational lesson is delivered, understood, assessed and, most importantly, sticky for the pupils to hold their attention.
Future skills
As a teacher with an academic background in environmental science, I believe that the purpose of education is to prepare young people for the future. But, even beyond the pandemic, planet Earth is rapidly changing and, depending on where you are in the world, many schools are not yet teaching pupils to be competent in how to use STEM+A (science, technology, engineering, mathematics + art) to solve complex problems or even to develop a meaningful social conscience. This means they might lack essential future skills and be ill-prepared for the challenging times ahead.
To ensure the children in my classroom, whether virtual or in person, understand the concept of living sustainably, I have brought the UN Sustainable Development Goals into my lessons, linking all topics to at least one of these Global Goals. The SDG’s are an internationally agreed set of 17 objectives which act as a holistic blueprint for peace and prosperity, for people and the planet. They include aims for Zero Hunger (SDG2), Clean Water and Sanitation for all (SDG6), Responsible Consumption (SDG12) and Climate Action (SDG13).
Providing a quality education
If we really want to support young people we need to move with the times and that is where new developments in EdTech, encompassing education for climate change and sustainability, can prove highly effective. SDG4 is for Quality Education and Target 4.7 of the goal states that by 2030, we should ensure that all learners acquire the knowledge and skills needed to promote sustainable development, including education, sustainable lifestyles, human rights, gender equality, promotion of a culture of peace, global citizenship and an appreciation of cultural diversity. EdTech can really give young people an advantage as we wait for international educational strategies to catch up.
Twin Science is a vibrant EdTech startup which embodies all that is good with EdTech. There is the Twin App which allows teachers to set and track hands-on homework and intelligent quizzes, education kits where students learn crucial concepts like coding, robotics and AI with a plethora of curriculum-aligned lessons. The company has hosted interactive shows live on YouTube produced with Imperial College London and the Royal Academy of Engineering and has recently been selected as a 2022 TechPioneer by the World Economic Forum. They are definitely an EdTech company to watch!
A sticky app to promote sustainability
The Twin App is dynamic and hugely engaging. It provides STEM+A Challenges that pupils can do at home or in the classroom. There are 5 minute Discovery Bits, in which an enormous range of young people, teachers and professionals share short lessons via interactive videos. These are aligned to the SDGs and include a vast array of topics which address the problems, and more importantly the solutions, that can help young people face the challenges ahead. There are ‘lessons’ on autonomous vehicles, robot bees, biomimicry in architecture, novel developments in renewable energy and even the anatomy of jellyfish. Learning through these videobites is much more interesting to young people than the dry objectives in many national curricula. There is even a Discovery Bit created by Antony Jinman, a polar explorer, helping to raise awareness about climate change and the amount of new content is growing as more enthusiastic creators join the team.
Within the Twin App there are also DIY projects that young people can undertake in school or at home, thousands of STEM trivia questions along with a safe & moderated platform that can be opted out if necessary. The app encourages project based learning and allows children to play games, earn coins and level up. Teachers or parents can even access childrens’ monthly skill reports. We all know that many young people love playing on electronic devices but they also love to learn, why not channel their time and energy into something tangible?
Hands-on kits to challenge and engage
In another feat of creativity Twin Science have also developed Twin Robotic Kits which immerse young inventors into the world of robotics and coding. The World Economic Forum announced Twin as one of the eight winners of the inaugural Smart Toy Awards in 2021. Today’s children are the adults of the future, a future shaped by artificial intelligence and robotic technologies. These coding kits, where they can learn the basics of robotic technologies with fun experiments, are based on Arduino technology and allow children to do described experiments or independently-led projects with LEGO™ compatible modules. There is a fabulous education kit that I’m just getting started with my pupils on projects that link to the KS2 and KS3 national curriculum.
Promoting conscience and competence
The company’s philosophy aligns with my own, aiming to improve the ‘future skills’ of children such as problem-solving & critical thinking to understand and question the global-scale problems, creative thinking to generate solutions and innovations to these problems, a sense of social responsibility to care about these problems in the first place and the self-confidence & growth-mindset to tackle these problems with a hopeful attitude. Twin Science also adopts an holistic approach to education and links everything to real life in order to get children to think about how to tackle global problems at a systems-level.
Shaped by insight from working with thousands of children, Twin Science has a STEM4Good approach to inspire children. The app and kits encourage children to actively think, stay curious and keep questioning to prepare them for tomorrow’s challenges and jobs; design and creativity, drawing and imagination, exploration and curiosity, robotics and problem solving, observational and reasoning and communication and self awareness. This platform is transformational for teaching!
It’s wonderful that the company also has a huge social conscience. For each digital subscription purchased, they give one digital subscription to a child from an economically disadvantaged background. For each kit purchased, they donate a portion to the World Science Movement (WSM), which aims to give children in emergent nations better access to STEM education.
Changing with the times
Despite being a relatively old teacher in age, I’m a new advocate for EdTech. To address issues such as climate change and biodiversity loss young people will need practical skills needed in order to transition towards a net zero lifestyle alongside creative thinking and develop technological solutions in the future. Where better to start than early in their journey through school? Twin Science is suitable for children of ages 7 to 12. Problem solving will build resilience and give pupils the ability to cope with, and rise to, the inevitable challenges and set-backs they will meet in the course of their lives, and come back stronger from them.
Finally, as a parent of two teenagers soon to depart for university to study STEM subjects, I just wish Twin Science had been founded a decade ago. Then my children, and I, could have benefited from this technology. They would have loved the meaningful, sticky edutainment provided by the app and kits or recommended ideas for practical hands-on projects would have kept them busy. Nonetheless, as a teacher, I still have the time to embrace EdTech and transform my teaching.
By now, climate change is no breaking news — children are already hearing about it and seeing it around them.
As with every difficult subject, developmental psychologists recommend that caretakers and educators should step in to ensure children are learning about climate change in an age-appropriate and factually correct way, while being mindful of their emotional wellbeing. Climate change is a reality. Rather than avoiding the subject, you can talk about it in a safe place to help them develop resilience.
Climate change awareness has two dimensions: scientific understanding and conscience. In other words, it requires a double-winged learning approach. What do we mean by that? Nurturing the kids’ interest in science but giving equal importance to a moral sensibility towards the world.
It may seem challenging, and it’s definitely a sensitive topic. All you need is to do some homework and come up with the right strategy. We hope this article helps you clarify climate change for kids.
Talking to Your Kids About Climate Change
The first step to being a great teacher is being a great student. It’s one thing to know about it, and another to know it well enough that you can explain in basic terms! So let’s start with the basics of climate change.
What is climate change?
Shortly defined by scientists on NASA ClimateKids, climate change is a change in the average conditions in a region over a long time. It may not sound so dire, but it is. Global temperature is not simply changing. The change is gaining acceleration year by year.
In the last 100 years, the Earth has warmed by 1 degree Celcius. Here’s how significant that 1 degree can be — in the last ice age, it was only 6 degrees Celsius colder than today.
What is greenhouse gas? What is the greenhouse effect?
Some gases wrap up the Earth like a blanket. The heat coming from the Sun in the day are released back into the air at night. That blanket, our atmosphere, traps some of the heat. This is called greenhouse effect. It’s actually a good thing that keeps our planet warm.
Most of the greenhouse gases naturally exist in the Earth’s atmosphere. They consist of water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane, ozone, nitrous oxide, and chlorofluorocarbons.
Now, imagine putting too many blankets on. It creates an excess of heat. These “blankets” in question are massive and permanent, and they can do irreversible harm to ecosystems.
How to Explain Climate Change to a Child
Unlike its name, global warming is a cold harsh truth. Especially for younger kids, the raw scientific explanation may be too much to digest at once. Hence, you need strategies to talk about effects of global warming for kids.
In this section we will briefly touch upon tactics and ideas you can use while teaching kids about climate change. Of course, it eventually comes down to the age group, level of knowledge, interests, and likes of the child.
Start with Basic Climate Change Facts
Educators and developmental psychologists suggest keeping things simple, especially with younger children in preschool. In these ages, children are inclined to believe that the world is a good place, and the adults can handle pretty much everything.
You can start by asking what they already know, and introduce them to the overall picture. The blankets around the earth are getting thicker, but there are things we can do to change back to the right kinds of blanket!
Don’t forget to talk about the actions that scientists and climate change activists are taking, so that they will feel safe, and feel like they can participate in saving our dear planet Earth!
Explain Human Causes of Climate Change
Showing the effects of human influence over time is a concrete and actionable method. Moreover, children learn through concrete examples. It’s a good strategy to help them relate the science to their personal experiences.
Luckily, there are many resources online. You can use graphs and satellite images to show examples of climate change and its correlation with human activity.
For example, most adults today know human chlorofluorocarbon emission has affected the ozone layer, and how it repaired itself over time as global awareness increased and the use of chlorofluorocarbon product decreased.
A similar direct link was observed in the beginning of the pandemic when motor vehicle activity ceased briefly during lockdowns. In many cities, the air quality increased dramatically. Imagine what longer term measures against air pollution can do!
Explore Climate Change Activities for Kids
We have curated just the solution for a fun way to engage children with climate action – Climate Change Action content on the Twin app featuring British polar explorer Antony Jinman! Want to explore the STEM activities, games, and educational content on the Twin app specially geared towards climate awareness?
Use the code CLIMATECHANGE100 to claim your free gift — one-month of digital subscription!
Access all exclusive STEM and climate education content on the Twin app and instill the love of science in your child.
There’s a broad range of activities to try while teaching climate change to kids. You just need to find a fit with the child’s age, interests, and talents:
Experiments about melting ice and rising water levels
Do a puzzle about climate change keywords and terms (e.g.: climate, weather, global warming, carbon footprint, carbon emission, fossil fuel, greenhouse effect)
Make a Climate Action Plan
A current study on climate anxiety surveying 10,000 young people in 10 countries revealed that overall, 75% of the youth finds the future frightening. Such fear of the future comes from a sense of lack of control, hopelessness.
Teaching about climate change is a great first step, but you should also leave room for hope and action. This is where a climate action plan comes in! There are so many things you can change in your daily practices that can make a huge impact in the long run.
It can be anything from small habits such as paying attention to unused light bulbs, not wasting water, to larger projects you can carry out as a family, such as going zero waste, reducing food waste and recycling.
Overall, the aim is to build a sustainable relationship between your child and the nature based on love and not fear so that they become eco-responsible Earth citizens!
Zero Waste is a goal defined as a waste management philosophy that includes waste prevention, more efficient use of resources, reviewing the causes of waste generation, preventing or minimizing waste generation, and in case of waste, collecting it separately at its source and ensuring recycling.
2- What are the advantages to be provided by taking the zero waste approach as basis?
❖ Increased efficiency ❖ Increased performance due to clean environment ❖ Reducing costs as waste is prevented ❖ Ensuring the reduction of environmental risks ❖ Ensuring that employees have a “sensitive consumer” feeling as they contribute to the development of environmental protection awareness within the organization. ❖ Ensuring that the institution has the title of “Environmentalist” in national and international markets, thus increasing its reputation.
3- Can a waste tracking system be installed?
The institutions and participants involved in the Zero Waste Project are curious about how wastes contribute to the economy. At this point, it is very important that a waste tracking system is set up and that the citizen is able to distinguish it precisely at home and follow the fate of the waste it takes to the waste collection point with great effort. In this regard, there are municipalities that project the systems where waste will be tracked on site and deliver it to the Ministry of Environment and Urbanization. Within the framework of university-public cooperation, it is also promising to carry out studies that measure the level of awareness and knowledge of people on the regional basis. The Zero Waste Project has increased awareness of the environment, making it much easier for municipalities to start their recycling journey . In addition, financing opportunities for environmentally friendly projects continue to increase with this project.
4- How to Install Zero Waste System?
While establishing a zero waste management model in an institution, primarily determined 7-stage road map is followed. These stages are as follows:
Determination of focus points
Current due diligence
Planning
Identification and supply of needs
Education and Awareness
Application
Reporting
5- What should be done for the Zero Waste system to work more effectively?
As of 2019 in Turkey, the number of institutions involved in the project known as Zero Waste is 18,750. These institutions or companies deliver the waste they have separated at their source to the municipalities and in return, they receive a signed receipt showing the amount of waste. This amount is entered into the waste management system by the institution itself, and an automatic calculation and graph such as how many trees saved the waste collected over time, how much raw material it provides to the economy are obtained. However, these data do not provide information about exactly where and how waste collected from the institution is used in the field.
At the beginning of the project, a training is given to the institutions by the Ministry of Environment and Urbanization. However, in the coming periods, the Ministry may inspect and control the institutions, solve the problems faced by the practitioners at the source, and reward those who do their job well.
YGA raises biplane youths that allow us to look to the future with hope. These young people both wings of conscience and equipment; develop while producing projects useful to humanity. With the imitations they develop, they produce radical solutions to social problems.
YGA has local and national startups in the fields of energy, tourism, education, science and arts.
Twin is one of those startups. Using technological modules similar to Lego, you can make unique experiments and technological toy.
As YGA and Twin, it is actually realizing 4 of the United Nations Development Goals.
While eliminating the inequality of opportunities in education with science sessions in Anatolia, domestic and national technologies, Twin Science and Coding set developed by engineers bring together future generations with science and technology in support of quality education.
With the Twin Science Festival held every year, we organize training and workshops in different disciplines for children who are the future of national development.
At the same time, we organize a science festival in which we raise awareness of children in the environment and smart cities and find solutions to the problems around them.
While doing all these activities, we act together with domestic and global brands, companies and organizations to make more impact. Only a few of these companies are Facebook, Yapi Kredi Bank, BASF and Turkcell.
You can see which main and sub-targets you support from the visuals, you can contact us. Twin and YGA are ready for more powerful and digital tomorrows. If you want to support us by donating.
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