"They tell us they need resources to teach 'both sides' of climate change well," said Susan Buhr, who runs teacher workshops as director of the education and outreach program of the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Science at the University of Colorado.
"From our perspective, there aren't 'both sides,'" she added. "There is the scientifically credible side, and then there is the misrepresentation side in the public dialogue."
But other regions and states, including some with conservative-leaning politics such as West Virginia, have strong standards for earth science, said Mark McCaffrey, program director of the National Center for Science Education, which has long defended the teaching of evolution in public schools and earlier this year announced it would start doing the same for climate science. California and Massachusetts are among states viewed as progressive in climate science because they integrate climate literacy principles into the state standards.
In a California ninth grade ecology unit within biology class, for example, students might examine a 100-year survey of the state’s wildlife population to illustrate the impact climate change is having on animals today.
In Victoria Matthew’s biology class in Baltimore, students examined global ocean water temperatures and coral bleaching, and how that relates to climate change. A hands-on activity included an oyster dissection, and Matthew discussed how climate change is expected to impact oyster populations in Chesapeake Bay.
Efforts are underway to expand curriculum in classrooms. Among the most promising is an initiative underway in Maryland and Delaware, one of 15 test cases funded by the National Science Foundation to research ways to improve climate education [Sidebar: Joint science effort pushes climate education in Maryland and Delaware].
The test program encourages scientists and educators to work together to address local impacts – sea-level rise in the Chesapeake Bay, or rising temperatures in urban areas – and develop lessons that could apply elsewhere in the curriculum, said the study's principal investigator Donald Boesch, of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science.
Most information for educators focuses on global climate change, but Boesch said greater learning takes place when climate impacts are examined at the local level.
Similar climate education research programs focused on local impacts are being developed for Great Lakes and southeastern states.
But there is a larger goal here, educators say.
On May 11, the National Research Council, in coordination with the National Science Teachers Association, the American Association for the Advancement of Science and Achieve released the draft Next Generation Science Standards, laying out key scientific ideas and practices all students should learn by the end of high school. Replacing standards issued more than a decade ago, the framework aims to connect knowledge from various disciplines into a "coherent and scientifically based" world view. Climate change factors highly in the effort, which emphasizes earth and space content as well as cross-cutting themes such as modeling, systems behavior, and uncertainty.
Educators say the push to improve the quality of climate change education would directly affect the 26 states that have partnered to develop the standards and could ripple through the entire educational system. Climate change, in effect, has become the poster child for what the National Academy of Sciences hopes to accomplish with science education.
"If we can get the standards ... climate-rich, then that's going to have a domino effect in getting into state standards, and getting into textbooks and curricula," said Karsten at the National Science Foundation.
See what we're tweeting about
28 Comments
Add CommentNo comments yet?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI predict that once the usual crowd find this new article, and the long weekend ends, you'll soon see the predictable attacks on science, the Al Gore hate, the cherry-picking, the smears, the unsupported assertions and outright lies, the outdated statistics, the quoting out of context and so on.
Skipping over villagegeek's ideological agenda-driven comment (nothing about science).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGood article on presenting the challenges of presenting such a topic. However, it's largely irrelevent in 2012 as to what specifics are taught in the curriculum of particular American states. The population is going to form opinions from a multitude of media sources. Better to emphasize more math, physics, chemistry, biology, etc.
I was reccently in a science seminar in Korea. When questions opened to the floor the Korean students asked us questions about chemical composition, stratigraphy, etc. I was quite pleasantly astounded at their level of competences in the sciences. They had a solid base to move into the real world with real issues. Bottom line...kids need the tools to think for themselves. They aren't getting these in some western education systems.
If they taught kids scientific methods for experiments on the climate than perhaps we would have something useful. When climate science is nothing more than spewing forth the dogma of global warming as predicted by climate models created in fantasy computer worlds, then we don't have anything happening for education, just more indoctrination.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThough, this is to be expected since the Warmists don't actually want their "evidence" and "Science" looked at too closely and kids have a tendency to see what is obviously flawed and point it out.
About the only difference between the human created global warming dogma and creationist theory is at least with global warming we can observe the real atmosphere to prove the theory wrong.
Why should the question be whether a warmer world is better or worse for humanity? We can move to Canada and Siberia. Some will die in floods, storms, and droughts, but the species will survive.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor many, many species, a warmer world threatens extinction.
priddseren, Do you really think that it is only models that show warming? We have actual temperature readings that show that the warming is real. We also have laboratory experiments showing the CO2 is a greenhouse gas.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe models are useful, of course. They show that the recent warming would probably not be happening without the recent CO2 increase.
I guess we're not such a superior species, after all.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNot sure who this "we" is in your statement that "we can move to Canada and Siberia." If you can fit over 7 billion people in both without overcrowding or rendering both places uninhabitable it'll be a miracle (Siberia is big, but is it THAT big?), and that's assuming both places had non-hostile climate at the time.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"The recent warming would probably not be happening without the recent CO2 increase."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI must disagree, emphatically. There is so much more to the earth's warming trend that can be explained by the extreme solar maximum, along with the exponential increase in volcanic activity we are experiencing. It is a no brainer that volcanic activity spews more CO2 than anything we humans could do in a century of industrial activity. It is also a fact that the eatgh is still not as warm as it was before the last Little Ice Age. So, please give me a break.
sluiceman,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this1) For the last 35 years, solar activity has declined, while warming has increased.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/solar-activity-sunspots-global-warming.htm
2) "The 35-gigaton projected anthropogenic CO2 emission for 2010 is about 80 to 270 times larger than the respective maximum and minimum annual global volcanic CO2 emission estimates. It is 135 times larger than the highest preferred global volcanic CO2 estimate of 0.26 gigaton per year (Marty and Tolstikhin, 1998)."
http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/hazards/gas/climate.php
3) "a) Globally temperatures are warmer than they have been during the last 2000 years, and
b) the causes of Medieval warming are not the same as those causing late 20th century warming."
http://www.skepticalscience.com/medieval-warm-period.htm
"There is so much more to the earth's warming trend that can be explained by the extreme solar maximum..."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou've GOT to be kidding me...People who show this much ignorance on a subject should refrain from opining on it entirely. The sad thing is, maybe sluiceman doesn't even know that EVERYTHING in their post is wrong.
The evolution of denial:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this1) It's cooling. An ice age is coming.
2) It might be warming, but it's not our fault. It's natural.
3) It might be our fault, but it would ruin our economy to fix it.
4) Warming is good for people. CO2 is good for plants.
5) At least most of the US might be OK.
Some examples of denial:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisClaiming that "there's no proof that cigarettes cause cancer" after the evidence is strong. (Heartland Institute's past efforts.)
Claiming that the Earth is cooling when the evidence is that it's warming.
Claiming that it's the Sun, when the evidence is that it's CO2.
Claiming that it's natural, when the evidence is that the change is caused by human activity.
Claiming that it's happened before, when there has never before been such a rapid and prolonged increase in CO2 and temperature.
Claiming that warming stopped in 1998, when any objective analysis indicates that that is unlikely.
Saying that there are too many unknowns, in an attempt to obstruct and distract, when enough is known that we need to act, and our best evidence is that action is urgently needed. Sure, there are lots of unknowns, and there will always be lots of unknowns. We can't afford to wait until we have all the answers, which will never happen.
I don't have a problem with facts. I have a problem with falsehoods, deceptions, and distractions.
Biology and physics whouldn't even fly easily here in KS, where they want the Bible taught instead.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"If they taught kids scientific methods for experiments on the climate than perhaps we would have something useful."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd when they come back and say the same things the others have been saying, you'll call them idiots all the same.
"The issue is potential climate change and not cigarettes. Please stay on topic."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDon't undestand the concept of comparison either do you. Or perhaps you don't remember the ad campagns claiming one things, when the data clearly showed another. Or was his statement just to deep for you?
Most of the points that you wrote are nonsense unrelated to what was written, except one.
"You wrote-
Saying that there are too many unknowns, in an attempt to obstruct and distract, when enough is known that we need to act, and our best evidence is that action is urgently needed. Sure, there are lots of unknowns, and there will always be lots of unknowns. We can't afford to wait until we have all the answers, which will never happen."
Nice of you to completely ignore the 5 statements prior to that one and cherry-pick as you did... hmmm
"You BELIEVE that urgent actions are necessary, but the facts do not support your belief. The unknowns are what the rate of temperature change will be in the real system over different timescales and whether any change in temperature at the actual rate will be a harm or a benefit. Those are the basic unknowns you wish we would ignore and just want others to accept your beliefs."
And you believe we should sit back and wait until the house is on fire before we buy a fire extinguisher or a phone to call for help.
Have you never been to any large cities, never seen entire lakes or seas dry up?
There is a change happening do we really need to know it's rate to start looking at ways to NOT effect it at all?
It doesn't matter if it's going to be better or worse, if we follow your advise we'd be hosed either way as NO ONE would be prepared for it.
No one is ignoring those concerns, they're just saying we should prepare for the worst and hope for he best. You're suggesting we should prepare for the best and completely ignore the worst.
Cont:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"In addition, there is the huge unknown of whether any actions by the US can have any reasonable expectation to impact the overall situation in a substantial way. There appears to be no workable means to stop CO2 from rising for decades since developing nations want to provide energy and personal transportation to their citizens. In your opinion, does it make sense for the USA to spend hundreds of billions to take actions that would result in worldwide CO2 levels to be at 450 ppm vs. 450 ppm by 2050?"
Never heard of innovation have you? Discovery of new power sources, more efficient appliances and factories, none of that would help in anyway would it? You want a workable means to stop CO2, stop burning things. Ever even consider the possiblity that the US could find a cleaner form of energy that we could then use to help those struggling nations? I doubt it. I don't know about ge556 but I for think it makes sense for the US to develop an energy supply not based on national boundries and dependant on third world dictators to power our nation, in the process finding a way to keep from poisoning it's citizens at the same time. These are big things to work through, but following yours and every other deniers advice of sit back, shut up, and watch it happen first, is the wrong way to go. Unless you're hoping for extinction.
Do you believe that makes sense?
pokerplyer,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThanks, sort of, for your acceptance of the fact that most of the deniers' arguments are nonsense, even though you did it as an attempt to ridicule me.
As for the question of what do we do about it: Some climate scientists and economists are backing Carbon Fee and Dividend, which puts a slowly increasing fee on carbon fuels when they come out of the ground or into the country. The proceeds are then rebated to the population on a per-capita basis, as a monthly or annual Green Check. 2/3 of the people would get back as much as or more than the fee costs them, but would have incentive to be more efficient.
There would be energy cost adjustments at the border, to remove the incentive to move high-energy manufacturing abroad. Countries with their own comparable system would be exempt. This would encourage fuel exporting and manufacturing countries to set up CF&D, so that they collect the money for their own citizens, instead of having the US collect a fee on what we import from them.
http://www.citizensclimatelobby.org/node/444
A version of CF&D has been introduced in Congress as the Save Our Climate Act (SOCA).
Unlike Cap and Trade, which encourages people to game the system, and costs the consumer a lot of money while enriching others, Carbon Fee and Dividend is simple, effective, fair, and won't cost the average consumer anything.
pokerplyer,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou seem to have not read carefully. It doesn't take much administration to handle the fees on the relatively small number of producers and importers of fossil fuels.
There are border adjustments to address the competitive issues. That part would perhaps be the more difficult part.
Wow ... you really forwarded your arguement by putting 'Tard' into someone's ID.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is the real problem with you left wing liberal zealots. You think that if people do not agree with you they must be mentally impared. You then resort to school yard name calling in an attempt to bully them into submission. Unfortunately that is not going to work and it just makes you look stupid.
evosburgh,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI agree with you, except that it's not a majority of one camp, and it's not exclusive to one camp. There is name calling and bullying on both sides, but not by everyone.
Name callers, please stop it.
"Unfortunately in the real world no such source of energy exists."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNever look up do you. You know that giant ball of plasma that's been producing energy for the last several billion years. Are we just going to ignore that?
"You hope for some great discovery. I look for what will work in the real world."
I don't hope, I know it will come, just as flight came, just as rocketry took us to the moon, and just as the transistor gave us the internet and modern computing power. You are simply looking to maintain the status quo, while at the same time deriding those who push boundaries. Contributing nothing to the advancement of society while actively pursuing it's denigration, by advocating for us to wait until our only planet is destroyed before we take any steps to prevent our imposition on the planet and it's finite resources.
I do see that just as last time, and just as I pointed out earlier, you once again ignore the substance of a post and cherry pick singular aspects out of context and attempt to refute them in a similar manner, out of context.
Agreed. I actually just placed the label in there as a reflection of the treatment that is being handed out by poster such as Vendicar. I actually do not care what political affiliation people may or may not have (because I actually believe that both parties are different sides of the same corrput coin). What I do care about is that the majority of citizens in this country have become so mentally lazy that they will/can not think for themselves. The result is that as soon as they hear that an 'expert' has made some sort of statement of 'fact' they believe it. What is worse is that there is a huge amount of data that is readily, and freely, available. Armed with that data and a spreadsheet you can do a lot of 'fact' checking on your own.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAll right all you climate changers. You have new marching orders: The UN says climate change is out and "save the species" is in. So, in the next year as you do what you are told and the climate change articles go away and you obediently begin your new quest to save the planet with junk "science", be truthful with yourself. Fess up and don't forget your past emotional zeal over something so unreal.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this911Researcher,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYour disdain for people who care about the Earth is unbecoming. But not so much as your disdain for facts. Climate change is real, as evidenced by the actual global temperature increase.
"Science doesn't know...".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisScience does not have a brain. Science can't know anything.
Science is a form of reasoning that depends on observation, and interpreting those observations with logic and math.
Your post makes you sound very confused.
"It is a no brainer that volcanic activity spews more CO2 than anything we humans could do in a century of industrial activity."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is a classic example of why observation and logical deduction is so important to the scientist.
From the USGS site on the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory,
"Our studies show that globally, volcanoes on land and under the sea release a total of about 200 million tonnes of CO2 annually... ...while 200 million tonnes of CO2 is large, the global fossil fuel CO2 emissions for 2003 tipped the scales at 26.8 billion tonnes. Thus, not only does volcanic CO2 not dwarf that of human activity, it actually comprises less than 1 percent of that value."
"Ge556
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe issue is potential climate change and not cigarettes. Please stay on topic."
Pokerplayer, since when is a metaphor off topic?
Ge556 wrote a very valid rebuttal and you cast it off as casually as you do your cigarettes ashes.
You can obfuscate all you like, but what he said was 100% correct whether you like it or not.
When you said, "There appears to be no workable means to stop CO2 from rising for decades since developing nations want to provide energy and personal transportation to their citizens.", you have suggested two things, A-there is a problem and B-there is no solution.
This is the same conclusion all AGW deniers will have to eventually succumbed to because they were in fact wrong about global warming in the first place and now it is just damage control of their own short sighted views in the past. What is the point of the statement if CO2 is not a problem as you suggested in the first place?
It is really pointless to keep up the ruse after saying that.
20 years ago the capitalists were calling AGW hogwash and poppycock when scientist warned of global warming as a result.
Now they are saying the same about AGW when global warming is undeniable, and saying it is completely natural and caused by anything but man, no matter how ridiculous their arguments are. Co2 from volcanic activity is just one classic example. Next they will say it is caused by all the hot air from liberals, like their own hot air is not a part of the equation.
Michael Savage got it wrong again. Conservative thinking is a mental disease. Only progressive thinking can save this planet from extinction.
Actually, the title of the article should be "Political Indoctrination Taken to the Next Level - Orwell Approves"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this