Tackling big issues
Young people need to be equipped to deal with the future they’ll be living and working in.
Socio-scientific issues – big issues – can form rich, real-life contexts for developing students’ thinking, visioning and problem-solving skills, action competence and an array of key competencies. They can also be embedded in local curriculum.
Big issues, by nature, are complex and difficult to solve – and they can be overwhelming to explore as a whole. Breaking them down to focus on one or two questions for inquiry-based learning is a useful strategy.
Enabling ākonga to make informed decisions and build hope for the future should underpin any big issue we tackle in the classroom.
Prompting questions/ngā pātai
How do you define what constitutes a big issue/socio-scientific issue?
Are all big issues socio-ecological?
Can you name some big issues underpinned by chemistry and physics as well as biology and Earth science?
What big issues do you face in your local area?
Why is it important to include time to find solutions and be proactive with decisions?
The teachers in the video were prompted to use climate change as the topic for discussion. Are their comments still valid when tackling other big issues?
Transcript
Mairi Borthwick
We have to be looking at the solutions and we have to really be making it clear to them that you’ve got to understand this because you’re going to be making the decisions for your future. That’s the way we’ve got to sell it – is it’s about how we can make sure you do have a future.
Dianne Christiansen
It’s finding the hooks so that you’re not always going on about icebergs melting, sea levels rising. We’re seeing massive effects of erosion and storm surge in our area. That might be the lead-in to talk about climate change.
Carmen Kenton
Hope and agency are really, really powerful ways of hooking kids in. Students often feel a bit overwhelmed with climate change and feel like things are too big. If they have hope that what they could do will make a difference and if we give them the agency to do something proactive, that is quite engaging for them. It’s about finding how your values sit in the world.
Lian Soh
We need to highlight to students that we can get things done globally, whether it’s to address biodiversity, resource scarcity, natural hazards and stuff. All of those things require governments and different groups, including private business, to work together.
Dianne Christiansen
You have to lead by example and make it accessible for everybody.
Acknowledgements
Mairi Borthwick, Head of Science, Freyberg High School
Dianne Christenson, Teacher, Whareama School
Carmen Kenton, Science Teacher, Riccarton High School
Lian Soh, Science and Chemistry Teacher, Pāpāmoa College
Concept cartoon from Climate change – challenging conversations and Inquiry and action learning process. © The University of Waikato Te Whare Wānanga o Waikato
Drone footage of Riversdale Beach, by Michael Hardy. Released under Creative Commons licence CC BY 3.0
Drone footage of Castle Point coast, by Jun Yamog. Released under Creative Commons licence CC BY 3.0
Students creating a katipō habitat and learning on a tablet, by Dianne Christenson. © Whareama School
pH testing, by Carmen Kenton. © Riccarton High School
Students trapping pests and checking traps and tracking tunnels, by Lian Soh. © Pāpāmoa College
Dianne Christenson, students and parents on a planting day, courtesy of Enviroschools
