When students first see the climate clock and understand how little time we have to achieve the 1.5°C target set by the IPCC (our best case scenario), some will state in utter disbelief and anger, “Why are we here right now.”  Meaning they don’t want to be in school.  

Millions of students around the globe express this sentiment.  Fridays For Future has led the way on organizing school strikes because of the lack of climate action.  Ironically, one of the most impactful ways young people have been able to take climate action is to cut school and strike.  Schools, along with the streets, can be the place where students act on climate change.  

This is why Teach Earth Action trains teachers to integrate Action Learning in their classes.  Action Learning leverages students’ passion and energy, unleashing their capacity to protect the planet and their futures.  A teacher wrote to TEA explaining that they stopped teaching their students about the climate crisis because the problem seemed out of the students’ control and it ultimately depressed them.  The crisis is only out of our control if we do not orient our teaching and learning towards action, when our classrooms feel as urgent as the crisis itself. 

Teach Earth Action helps teachers develop Action Learning units to enable students to take control of the crisis.  TEA also helps connect students to non-profit and other civic organizations so they can express their learning out in the world.