4 September 2024 marked the beginning of the Council for Implementing Climate and Environmental Education in the Silesian Voivodeship at the Silesian Superintendent of Education’s Office. The newly appointed body is to develop and implement a complex educational programme regarding climate and environmental education in primary schools within the region. The Council includes scientists from the University of Silesia in Katowice:
- Magdalena Ochwat, PhD;
- Małgorzata Wójcik-Dudek, PhD, DLitt, Assoc. Prof.;
- Prof. Piotr Skubała;
- Agnieszka Skorupa, PhD;
- Joanna Godawa, PhD;
- Magdalena Christ, PhD;
- Prof. Ewa Łupikasza.
One of the first activities of the Council is launching a pilot programme for teachers of all subjects in December. The programme is planned to recruit 16 primary schools, with each of them delegating four teachers: two teaching grades 1-3 and two teaching grades 5-7. The key premise of the programme is to create teacher groups that combine experts from different fields, such as the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences.
The pilot edition is to cover approximately 70 teachers and provide intensive trainings taking place in January, February and March 2025. The teachers will be equipped with climate and environmental competencies that will support them in implementing the curriculum. During the trainings, the teachers will take part in classes on outdoor education, e.g. forest bathing, workshops based on the ‘Climate Fresk’, and film screenings during the ‘Kino z Klimatem’ series.
The model for the climate education to be developed and implemented will be based on ‘a language of elements’ for in the face of the climate crisis, elements demand to be reinterpreted and rediscovered. For example, water will be discussed in the context of drought, cloudbursts, glacier melting, increasing levels of seas and oceans, coastal flooding, and environmental migration. Each element opens new areas for discussing environmental problems.
Members of the Council wish to introduce climate and environmental knowledge along with the concept of ‘elements’ to all school subjects. The programme is to cover every subject, from the Polish language, history, biology and geography to PE and religious education. The unique base of content-tailored information, data and lesson scenarios will be created together with teachers. The element-based scenarios will saturate each subject with environmental and climate issues, enriching the educational programme with critical issues related to planet protection.
The programme is to broaden teachers’ knowledge and develop innovative lesson scenarios to be implemented in schools taking part in the project. The model of climate and environmental education will be based on the interdisciplinary approach taking into account various ecological aspects on the local and global scales. The programme’s premises include empathy development, active hope and a new definition of the good life with regard to intergenerational perspective and challenges related to the concept of planetary boundaries.
Thanks to the project, Silesia is becoming a trailblazer in climate and environmental education in Poland, focusing on the holistic approach to teaching that goes beyond the standard frameworks and addresses contemporary climate challenges.
