[ New Jersey’s teachers are now required to teach climate change
beginning in kindergarten, and across most subjects, including art,
social studies, world languages and PE. Supporters hope the lessons
will spread]
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ONE STATE MANDATES TEACHING CLIMATE CHANGE IN ALMOST ALL SUBJECTS –
EVEN PE  
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Caroline Preston
November 5, 2022
The Hechinger Report
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_ New Jersey’s teachers are now required to teach climate change
beginning in kindergarten, and across most subjects, including art,
social studies, world languages and PE. Supporters hope the lessons
will spread _

Suzanne Horsley, a wellness teacher at Toll Gate Grammar School, in
Pennington, New Jersey, speaks with a class of third graders about an
activity that combines physical education with climate change
instruction. , Credit: Caroline Preston/The Hechinger Report

 

PENNINGTON, N.J. — There was one minute left on Suzanne Horsley’s
stopwatch and the atmosphere remained thick with carbon dioxide,
despite the energetic efforts of her class of third graders to clear
the air.

Horsley, a wellness teacher at Toll Gate Grammar School, in
Pennington, New Jersey, had tasked the kids with tossing balls of yarn
representing carbon dioxide molecules to their peers stationed at
plastic disks representing forests. The first round of the game was
set in the 1700s, and the kids had cleared the field in under four
minutes. But this third round took place in the present day, after the
advent of cars, factories and electricity, and massive deforestation
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With fewer forests to catch the balls, and longer distances to throw,
the kids couldn’t keep up.

“That was hard,” said Horsley after the round ended. “In this
time period versus the 1700s, way more challenging right?

“Yeah,” the students chimed in.

“In 2022, we got a lot of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere,” said
Horsley. “What’s the problem with it, what is it causing?”

“Global warming,” volunteered one girl.

Two years ago, New Jersey became the first state in the country to
adopt learning standards
[[link removed]] obligating
teachers to instruct kids about climate change across grade levels and
subjects. The standards, which went into effect this fall, introduce
students as young as kindergarteners to the subject, not just in
science class but in the arts, world languages, social studies and
physical education. Supporters say the instruction is necessary to
prepare younger generations for a world — and labor market —
increasingly reshaped by climate change.

In Suzanne Horsley’s climate change lesson, yarn balls represent
carbon dioxide molecules. Students try to clear the atmosphere — or
playing field — of the balls. Credit: Caroline Preston/The
Hechinger Report

“There’s no way we can expect our children to have the solutions
and the innovations to these challenges if we’re not giving them the
tools and resources needed here and now,” said Tammy Murphy, the
wife of New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy and a founding member of former
Vice President Al Gore’s Climate Reality Action Fund, who pushed to
get the standards into schools. Just as students must be able to add
and subtract before learning calculus, she said, kids need to
understand the basics of climate change — the vocabulary, the logic
behind it — before they can tackle the climate crisis.

Historically, climate change has not been comprehensively taught in
U.S. schools, largely because of the partisanship surrounding climate
change and many teachers’ limited grasp
[[link removed]] of the science
behind it. That started to change in 2013, with the release of new
national science standards [[link removed]], which
instructed science teachers to introduce students to climate change
and its human causes starting in middle school.
[[link removed]] Still,
only 20 states [[link removed]] have adopted the
standards. A 2020 report [[link removed]] from the
National Center for Science Education and Texas Freedom Network
Education Fund found that many states that didn’t follow the new
guidance weren’t explicit in their standards about the human causes
of climate change, and a few even promoted falsehoods about its causes
and degree of seriousness. Meanwhile, discussion of climate change
outside of science class remains relatively rare, educators and
experts say.

New Jersey is trying to change that, but it’s not a simple task.
Like teachers around the country, educators here are exhausted after
years of Covid disruptions, and, as elsewhere, some schools face
dire teacher shortages
[[link removed]].
On top of this, many educators don’t feel prepared to teach climate
change: A 2021 survey
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164 New Jersey teachers found that many lacked confidence in their
knowledge of the subject, and some held misconceptions about it,
confusing the problem with other environmental issues such as plastic
pollution.

Carolyn McGrath, an art teacher at Central Valley High School, in
Pennington, New Jersey, shows off portraits of climate activists
painted by her students. Credit: Caroline Preston/The Hechinger
Report

For now, the climate instruction requirements haven’t faced much
pushback from climate deniers and conservatives, who’ve trained
their attacks
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on the state’s new sex-education standards. But state officials
anticipate some criticism as the lessons begin to roll out in
classrooms.

A more pressing concern — and one that plagues any education
initiative because of local control of schools — is that the lessons
are rolling out unevenly across the state. Schools in affluent towns
like Pennington tend to have more time and resources to introduce new
instruction; schools in poorer communities, like Camden
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that are often the most vulnerable to climate disasters, may lack the
resources to do so.

“I am happy to see New Jersey as a pioneer of climate change
standards,” said Maria Santiago-Valentin, co-founder of the Atlantic
Climate Justice Alliance, a group that works to mitigate the
disproportionate harm of climate change on marginalized communities.
But, she said, the standards will need to be revised if they fail to
adequately emphasize the unequal impact of climate change on Black and
Hispanic communities or ensure that students in those communities
receive the instruction.

New Jersey is making some effort to help teachers adopt the
standards, setting aside $5 million
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lesson plans and professional development, and enlisting teachers like
Horsley, who holds a master’s degree in outdoor education and has a
passion for the environment, to develop model lessons
[[link removed]].

Supporters are trying to ensure that teachers have plenty of examples
for teaching the standards in age-appropriate ways, with racial and
environmental justice as one of the key feature
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of the instruction.

“It’s not like we’re asking kindergarteners to look at the
Keeling Curve,” said Lauren Madden, a professor of education at the
College of New Jersey who prepared a report
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the standards, referring to a graph showing daily carbon dioxide
concentrations. “We’re trying to point out areas where we can
build some of those foundational blocks so that by the time students
are in upper elementary or middle school, they really have that solid
foundation.”

Cari Gallagher reads a book about Hurricane Sandy to her third graders
at Lawrenceville Elementary School. Credit: Caroline Preston/The
Hechinger Report

The hallway outside Cari Gallagher’s third grade classroom at
Lawrenceville Elementary School is decorated with messages from
students about what they can do to fight climate
change. Credit: Caroline Preston/The Hechinger Report

On a recent weekday, Cari Gallagher, a third grade teacher at
Lawrenceville Elementary School in central New Jersey, was reading to
her students the book “No Sand in the House!” which tells the
story of a grandfather whose Jersey Shore home is devastated by
Hurricane Sandy. Later, the students sat down to write about what
they’d heard, drawing connections between the book and their own
lives, world events or other books they’d read.

After the writing exercise, Gallagher directed the students to split
into small groups to build structures that would help provide
protection against climate change calamities. The kids used Legos,
blocks, Play-Doh and straws to create carports, walls and other
barriers.

That same morning, a kindergarten class at the elementary school
listened as their teacher, Jeffrey Berry, held up a globe and
discussed how different parts of the world have different climates.

At Hopewell Valley Central High School, in Pennington, art teacher
Carolyn McGrath piloted a lesson
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climate change this summer with a handful of students. The results of
the class — four paintings featuring climate activists — sat on
the windowsill of her classroom. 

“It felt empowering to see people like me, who reflect me and my
identities,” said Mackenzie Harsell, an 11th grader who’d created
a portrait of 24-year-old climate activist Daphne Frias
[[link removed]], who, like Mackenzie, is young, and is
disabled. “This project told me I could do anything.”

Research suggests education does have an impact on how people
understand climate change and their willingness to take action to stop
it. One study found
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college students who took a class that discussed reducing their carbon
footprint tended to adopt environment-friendly practices and stick
with them over many years. Another found
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educating middle schoolers about climate change resulted in their
parents expressing greater concern about the problem.

Jeffrey Berry, a kindergarten teacher at Lawrenceville Elementary
School, encourages his students to care for plants and nature.
Kindergarteners tend to the “garden of good manners,” pictured
here. Credit: Caroline Preston/The Hechinger Report

“Education is certainly a way that we could have perhaps slowed down
where we are right now in terms of the climate crisis,” said
Margaret Wang, chief operating officer with SubjectToClimate
[[link removed]], a nonprofit that is helping teachers
develop and share climate lessons. More jobs
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to climate change are already opening up, said Wang, and kids will
need skills not just to discover scientific innovations but to tell
stories, advocate, inspire and make public policy.

Back at Toll Gate elementary, Horsley, the wellness teacher, was
getting ready to hand off the third graders to their classroom
teacher. Before filing back into the school, a handsome brick building
that suffered flooding last year during Hurricane Ida
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students reflected on the lesson.

Ayla, a third grader dressed in jeans and tie-dye sneakers, said it
made her want to “do something” about climate change because “I
don’t want it to get so hot.”

Wes, another third grader, said adults could have done more to protect
the environment. “I think they’ve done a medium job because
they’re still producing a lot of carbon dioxide and a lot of people
are littering still.”

“I feel bad for the other animals because they don’t know about
it, so they don’t know what to do,” added his classmate, Hunter.

“We know about it,” said Abby, who was wearing a shirt emblazoned
with the words “Girl Power.” She said it was up to humans to drive
less and recycle and protect other species from climate disaster.

“When I first found out we were going to learn about climate change
in gym, I was like, that’s surprising, because normally we learn
that in class,” Abby added. “But I’m glad we did it in gym,”
she continued. “It was really fun.”

_Caroline Preston is a deputy managing editor who helps oversee
Hechinger's K-12 and higher ed coverage. She previously worked as a
features editor with Al Jazeera America’s digital team and a senior
reporter with The Chronicle of Philanthropy. Her writing has appeared
in publications including NBC News, The New York Times, The Washington
Post and Wired.com, while stories she has edited or written have been
honored by the Data Journalism Awards, the Education Writers
Association, the Online News Association and others. _

_This story about _climate change education
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produced by _The Hechinger Report [[link removed]]_, a
nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and
innovation in education. Sign up for the __Hechinger newsletter_
[[link removed]]_._

* Climate Change
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* Public Education
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