Ben Ballin, from Tide~ global learning, has contributed a post to the Cambridge Primary Review Blog. It’s titled From pessimism to hope: global learning and sustainability, and you can read it here. It begins:
When the Cambridge Primary Review conducted its Community Soundings in 2007, it encountered a widespread sense of the world as a threatening place for children. The Review’s Final Report (p 189) explains: “We were frequently told … that the wider world is changing, rapidly and in ways which it is not always easy to comprehend, though on balance they give cause for alarm, especially in respect of climate change and environmental sustainability.”
However, it then adds: “Pessimism turned to hope when witnesses felt they had the power to act. Thus, the children who were most confident that climate change need not overwhelm them were those whose schools had replaced unfocussed fear by factual information and practical strategies for energy reduction and sustainability.”
I have spent a quarter of a century thinking about how primary schools can help children engage with such information, and adopt such strategies. It remains work in progress. I hope that the following will help teachers as they create their own professional repertoire. …
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Ben is a consultant to the Geographical Association and Big Brum Theatre in Education and works regularly with members of NAEE’s core team.