A GHG Challenge for Northerners

In a Nutshell:

After reviewing background materials on reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and Suzuki’s Nature Challenge, students work in small groups to create a northern GHG Challenge.

Goal:

To encourage students to consider practical ways for northerners to reduce GHG emissions.

Background Learning:

Teachers and high school students should be familiar with the basic science of climate change as reviewed in:

• High school Backgrounder #2: The Greenhouse Effect
• High school Backgrounder #3: Greenhouse Gases (GHGs)
• High school Backgrounder #14: Helping in your own way

Intermediate level students should be familiar with the basic science of climate change as reviewed in:

• Intermediate Backgrounder #1: Climate Change Basics: What’s the Big Deal?
• Intermediate Backgrounder #3: Climate Change Solutions: We Can All Help!

Learning Outcomes:

Click on the icon for your territory to review the learning outcomes that are addressed by this lesson:

Introduction to Lesson Plan:

The Nature Challenge: Dr. David Suzuki, one of Canada’s best-known scientists, has appeared on numerous television programs and radio talk shows – with artists such as Randy Bachman, Nelly Furtado, and Bruce Cockburn – to encourage Canadians to take the Nature Challenge. Produced by the David Suzuki Foundation, The Nature Challenge is a list of the 10 most important things people can do to save the planet. Most of them focus on reducing climate change. These 10 actions are listed on the student handout The Nature Challenge, which is linked to this lesson.

Some of the actions on the Suzuki Nature Challenge list seem more applicable to southerners than to northerners. Buying locally grown and produced food, for instance, may not be a practical option for northerners. However, many northerners do hunt and gather country foods and there are other actions that northern students can take to reduce their GHG emissions.

Before the lesson, you may want to have your students read the recommended backgrounders or review the main ideas together. It’s important that students understand what greenhouse gases are, where they come from, and how they cause climate change. For suggestions on how students can learn from the Backgrounders in interesting, interactive ways, see the lesson entitled Getting Into the Backgrounders.

Download and make copies of the student handout and any of the recommended backgrounders you intend to use. For activity steps 5 and 6, it would be helpful for the students to have a copy of the backgrounder on solutions (Intermediate Backgrounder #3 or High School Backgrounder #14).

The source for the Nature Challenge is: David Suzuki Foundation: Suite 219, 2211 West 4th Avenue, Vancouver, BC, Canada http://www.davidsuzuki.org/

Activity:

1. Once students are familiar with the nature and causes of greenhouse gases (GHGs), and how they create climate change, distribute the student handout David Suzuki’s Nature Challenge. It describes the 10 most important actions that we can take to save the earth. Explain that the list was produced by the David Suzuki Foundation, a major Canadian environmental organization. Go through the actions one at a time, taking time to look at the reasons given for each one (note that point #3 doesn’t relate directly to GHG emissions).
2. On the board, write these three headings: Homes; Transportation; and Day-to-day choices.
3. Go through the handout with the students, and decide which actions fit under each of the headings above.

   Answer Key:
   Homes: points 1, 2
   Transportation: points 6–9
   Day-to-day choices: points 4, 5 and 10

4. Pose the question: This list was written primarily for people living in southern cities. What actions would be difficult for someone from your community?

   Answer Key: (Examples)
   “Eat less meat” – Would this apply to northerners who hunt for their meat supply?
   “Support transportation alternatives” – How possible is this in our community?

5. Now, divide students into small groups of three to five, and assign each group one of the three areas (homes, transportation, day-to-day choices). Give each of the groups a sheet of chart paper and a felt pen. (Note: depending on the size of the class, there may be more than one group working on each of the topics.) Direct each group to the section of the backgrounder that refers to their area.
   
   Ask the students to choose a facilitator and a recorder. Then, using both the information in the backgrounder and their knowledge of their communities, develop a list of at least three or four specific things that northerners could do to reduce their GHG emissions in the topic area. Ask the students to write their list on the chart paper, and be prepared to defend each of the actions they recommend.
   
   When the students have had time to complete their lists, bring the class back together to present their results, and create an integrated GHG Challenge for Northerners. Work with the whole class to identify the “Top 10” actions for northerners, just like Suzuki did in his Nature Challenge. Now you have completed your class “GHG Challenge for Northerners!”
6. It is one thing to create the challenge; another to do it:
   
   
   • David Suzuki suggests that we commit to three actions. Ask students to pick at least one thing they plan to do during the next month (or longer, if you think they can keep the commitment). Have a short discussion about who has chosen what, and why. Create a classroom chart listing names and actions.
   • Take the challenge to the community. Ask students to explain the GHG Challenge for Northerners to at least one person outside of the class (in their school or community), to get a response and, if possible, a commitment.
7. Document the Experience: Have students journal their experience, or write a report on:
   
   
   • Keeping their commitment to reduce GHGs (noting the internal and external pressures that make it difficult to keep their commitment)
   • Trying to spread the word to others: their families, friends, and community members (What have they found encouraging? Discouraging? What would they recommend to others trying to spread the word?)
8. Follow-up: Over the next few weeks, check with the students to see how they are doing with their chosen actions. Find out what kinds of supports help students to keep their commitments. What pressures make it difficult? Students may want to change their initial choices. At various points in this process, you may want to ask students to self-evaluate and write in how they are doing on the chart you have created.

Handouts:

Click on the icon for the handout that supports this lesson – Student Handout: David Suzuki’s Nature Challenge.

Student Web-Exchange:

Share your Challenge. Post your GHG Challenge for Northerners on the Student Web-Exchange. Perhaps you can also exchange information with other classes that have done this lesson on how well you are meeting the challenge in your school and in your community. Click on the icon to learn how to post materials.

Evaluation:

Evaluate students on:

• Participation
• Their GHG Challenge for Northerners
• Journal entries, reports
  

Enrichment Ideas:

Social Studies/English Language Arts/Drama

Spread the Word: Challenge your students to spread the GHG Challenge to their school and community. Spend some time discussing strategies; what are the best ways to get others in the school and community committing to the Challenge? Then divide into groups to do the work. Activities may include:

• Public Presentation: Develop a short skit or other form of public presentation to present the GHG Challenge for Northerners to another class, at a school assembly, and then perhaps to the town council.
• Political Action: Meet with local environmental groups and key policy-makers to discuss how individuals and organizations could be encouraged to take the GHG Challenge for Northerners.
• School Challenge: Challenge another school to beat you at the Nature Challenge.
• Write On! Write a short article or letter to the editor on the GHG Challenge for Northerners, to be sent to the school or local newspaper.
• Write to the Suzuki Foundation: The Suzuki Foundation publishes a newsletter, Finding Solutions, three times a year. It welcomes letters to the editor of 200 words or less. Ask students to compose a letter suggesting northern modifications to the Nature Challenge, and explaining why these modifications make sense in the north. Letters to the editor can be emailed to dtaylor@davidsuzuki.org, or mailed to Suite 219, 2211 West 4th Avenue, Vancouver, BC V6K 4S2.

Art

Artistic Presentation: Have students create a poster or series of posters to post in key locations in your school and community.

Bulletin Board Display: Have students create a bulletin board to catch the attention of other students and visitors to your school.

About the Author:

Yukon Conservation Society Curriculum Team – The team consists of teachers, writers, environmental educators and curriculum specialists. It worked with teachers across the north, helping them to create lesson plans for the website, and gathering input about website features, backgrounders and lesson plans that would be useful in northern classrooms.