Climate & Nature Ed in English
Why English?
If you are an English Teacher passionate about protecting our planet and empowering pupils and staff to tackle the climate and ecological crisis, on the surface, it may seem you are teaching the wrong subject – surely issues around changes in climate belongs in geography or science? But actually, as English teachers, we are in the brilliant position to highlight and push the environmental focus within our existing topics. Before we explore why, let’s look at some maths.
Our Current Situation
This graph, from The Guardian, demonstrates how we’ve just experienced the warmest February on record globally - 1.77C warmer than the pre-industrial average for the month - making it the ninth month in a row with record temperatures for the time of year.
This, of course, matches the rise in carbon dioxide levels, but note too how the trajectory of the graphs mirror record profit rises from major fossil fuel companies.
As global warming increases, as CO2 emissions increase, so to do fossil fuel company profits. These are graphs with lines that mirror our societal expectation of perpetual economic growth. Exploring recent climate-focused headlines set out the impact of this rise: oceans the hottest they’ve ever been; heatwaves & wildfires; floods, torrential rain, hail-storms; travel disruptions, school closures, death.
It’s terrifying. It’s the biggest existential threat we’ve ever collectively faced.
COP will save us!
Young people might say, well, no part of the world is untouched by the impacts of climate change – and we will face even more serious and irreversible damage to society and ecosystems if global warming exceeds 1.5°C. Young people might point to the United Nations declaration that climate change refers to long-term shifts in temperatures and weather patterns, mainly caused by human activities, especially the burning of fossil fuels. Young people might correctly recognise that what we need is for all the world leaders and all the people with influence from around the world to therefore meet and agree to stop fossil fuels so the earth can stop heating:
Like a Conference of Parties ... Or COP! Right? All of the parties involved will have the courage to rise to the scale of the challenge, right?
Right?
Well, no. Here’s another graph that shows CO2 emissions steadily rising as the conference of parties reaches number 28. And alongside it, a shocking graph (again from The Guardian) demonstrating, perhaps, the reason why after days, months, years of negotiating, agreeing a deal that would PHASE OUT fossil fuels (in order to reach the goal of limiting global heating to 1.5C) gets watered down again, and again, and again.
At COP26, fossil fuel lobbyists outnumbered delegates: Watch Alok Sharma fight back tears in COP26: “I apologise for the way this process has unfolded… and I am deeply sorry.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLmaumUTqVE
Our Government’s No. 1 Priority:
Well, say our optimistic young people, we can rely on our government – surely phasing out fossil fuels, lowering emissions, and sticking to the 1.5 pledge will be their number one priority? After all, in 2021, the UK enshrined in law new targets to slash emissions by 78% by 2035; plus, the Sustainability & Climate Change Strategy for Education a year later did include a promising foreword by the then Secretary of State for Education, the Rt Hon Nadhim Zahawi MP (in the ever changing carousel of Education Secretaries, he was number six of ten): “Learners need to know the truth about climate change – through knowledge-rich education. They must also be given the hope that they can be agents of change.”
Well, it’s a start – but in terms of the education suggested, the responsibility is placed in the hands of geography and science, and those which already contain opportunities to teach climate change and sustainability; it doesn’t explicitly mention English or other subjects. Moreover, it is a policy paper, a strategy – not legislation, and therefore, not compulsory.
More importantly, though, the foreword contains the inherent contradiction at the heart of our emergency: that of aiming for infinite growth on a planet with finite resources. Even the Department for Education website says its number one priority is to: “Drive economic growth.” This is at complete odds with the climate crisis.
Furthermore, our prime minister is rolling back on so many climate pledges and environmental commitments, weaponising the climate as part of a new culture war. This makes the mentions to social justice and Climate Change within the latest Ofsted subject report into English somewhat troubling – which texts are they speaking of? How were they used? In fact, which schools did they even visit?
It’s important we push back on the idea that texts exploring social issues & climate change somehow sacrifice literary merit (which is what, exactly?) Considering texts that our pupils can easily access and consideration of current issues is essential – every teacher I know will do this with great quality text-choices.
“It’s not Climate Change – it’s Everything Change.” Margret Atwood
The United Nations states that climate change is the defining crisis of our time, and it is happening even more quickly than we feared: and yet, daily life does not look like an emergency. The reality of the planet is not real for most people most of the time; and as educators, it is our job to make it real for the pupils we teach – to make sure they understand the reality of the world we are living in. As Secretary General António Guterres says, the “era of global boiling has arrived,” which means, in the words of Sir James Bevan, CEO Environment Agency, “The main thing for all of us – and the world - is the climate emergency.”
The overarching aim for the subject of English is successful communication: to read critically, fluently, and with good understanding; to write effectively and coherently; to speak with confidence and clarity; and to listen carefully. All the skills of language are essential to participating fully as a member of society – but what happens when our society is under threat? When forests, woodlands and other natural habitats across the world are in decline & fossil-fuel burning and rainforest-clearing and pollution-emitting cars and planes cause such destructive consequences?
Both successful communication and the climate crisis underpin everything – and through effective English teaching, we can begin to tackle both.
Advantages of English:
The subject of English has the huge advantage of reaching all year groups, all the time; it’s compulsory to study English up to KS4, and pupils often have a lesson of English a day. The possibilities of infiltrating the curriculum are endless, and offer a vast variety of approaches, skills and knowledge.
We are custodians of the education within our classroom; literature is the catalyst and conduit of our imaginations. Books cultivate empathy, and facilitate an intimate and profound engagement with the world. Books can open up the eyes, minds and hearts of our pupils, deepening connection to other people and to the earth around us. The science and data must be delivered with emotion to drive change, and literature is the perfect place to do just that; a recent example being ‘Mr Bates v The Post Office’, with the drama igniting mass outrage at the scandal twenty five years on from the first convictions for theft and fraud, in a way factual news couldn’t do; 180 years earlier, Dickens, after reading a 1843 parliamentary report on the extent of child labour in the country detailing “unimaginable horrors” chose to write a novella, with the purpose of opening reader’s hearts and minds (rather than his initial idea of a pamphlet).
And just as Dickens was having a go at his complacent readers, chastising them about their own ignorance - an ignorance that was in many cases a wilful ignoring of the plight of their fellow Londoners – so too will a focus on climate, nature and sustainability within English help to ensure that there will be no wilful ignoring of the plight of our world.
Ben Rawlence, co-founder of Black Mountains College, focusing on how to build a fair and just society within safe planetary boundaries, says: “This is a human crisis of values, of worldviews, of inequalities and historic injustice ... What needs to change goes much deeper than specific laws or policies, although these are important to fight for as well. You cannot change a worldview through laws alone - Education, the formal school system in particular, is the point of transmission of skills, knowledge and culture where a society reproduces itself. This, in my view, is among the social spaces with the most potential as a site of transformation.”
So, English is the perfect place to show your passion for protecting our planet and empowering pupils and staff to tackle the climate and ecological crisis; it’s incredibly easy to adapt our content to incorporate nature, because nature has inspired every aspect of our culture - from music to poetry to art to literature to science. And, as poet and other co-founder of BMC Owen Sheers says, the climate and ecological crisis is the condition of our time; so everything is informed by it, can be seen through its lens.
It is essential that we adopt a creative, curious, and encouraging approach to climate adaptation within our English curriculum, empowering young people, developing knowledge and skills, and offering, above all, hope.
Sarah Dukes is Sustainability Coordinator and English Teacher at The Chase School in Malvern; she passionately feels we must adapt our school curriculum to include explicit teaching on the climate crisis, sustainability, and nature connectedness. Follow @ecodukes
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/sustainability-and-climate-change-strategy
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/subject-report-series-english
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-enshrines-new-target-in-law-to-slash-emissions-by-78-by-2035
https://medium.com/matter/it-s-not-climate-change-it-s-everything-change-8fd9aa671804
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