teenagers expand their conceptions of climate change …€¦ · teenagers expand their conceptions...

Teenagers expand their Conceptions of Climate Change Adaptation through

Research-Education Cooperation

Oliver Gerald Schrot, Lars Keller, Dunja Peduzzi, Alina Kuthe, Maximilian Riede & David Ludwig

International Symposium on Climate Change and the Role of Education, Lincoln (UK), 13th April 2019

o My PhD-Project

o Research-Education Cooperation: Generation F3 – Fit for Future

o Teenagers expand their Conceptions of Climate Change Adaptation through Research-Education Cooperation

o Climate Change Education – What works?

o Discussion and Outlook

Overview

Oliver Gerald Schrot 13/04/2019

o Environmental Scientist by training

o Climate Change Adaptation and the Role of Education: Research, Engagement and Reflections for a 2-degree world and beyond (supervised by Prof. Johann Stötter)

o Institute of Geography, University of Innsbruck, Austria

My PhD-project


The research project: Generation F3 - Fit for Future

o Three-year climate change education research project funded by the Autonomous Province of Bozen/Bolzano South Tyrol (Italy)

o Coordinated by Institute of Geography (University of Innsbruck) & Institute for Earth Observation (EURAC Research)

o Climate Change Adaptation (in North- and South Tyrol)



Zebisch et al. (2018)

Who is research-education cooperation?

o 4 schools (2 in North Tyrol, Austria & 2 in South Tyrol, Italy)

o 4 intervention groups & 4 control groups

o 240 teenagers between 16 and 18 years

o 4 geography teachers

o 56 adaptation researchers, adaptation practitioners and officials


What is research-education cooperation?

o Generation F3 – Fit for Future is a research-education cooperation

o first year 2017/18 & second year 2018/19

o Climate Change Adaptation (Anderson 2012)

o Moderate-constructivist theory (Krahenbuhl 2016)

o Research-based learning setting on Climate Change Adaptation (Riede et al. 2017)


How does a research-education cooperation work?


In-school workshop I:

introduction to climate change

adaptationNovember 2017

In-school workshop II:

introduction to scientific working

In-school workshop III:

finding a research question

Expert workshop Iclimate change adaptation &

research questionJanuary 2018

In-school workshop IV:

specifying research approach

In-school workshop V:

introduction to data analysis

Expert workshop IIresearch approach

& data analysisApril 2018

In-school workshop VI:interpretating

results

In-school workshop VII:

preparing scientific

poster

Poster sessiondisseminating CC

adaptation researchJune 2018

Impressions from Generation F3 - Fit for Future


Teenagers expand their Conceptions of Climate Change Adaptation through Research-Education Cooperation

» conception: an idea of what something is like, or a basic understanding of a situation or a principle (Cambridge Dictionary)

» concept: a principle or idea (Cambridge Dictionary)


Research Questions

1. Which conceptions do high-school students hold about CC adaptation and what is the influence of year-long research-education cooperation?

2. What is the influence of year-long research-education cooperation on students’ ability to differentiate between CC adaptation and CC mitigation?


Sample

o Intervention group students (n=60)

o Control group students (n=40)

o Between 16 and 18 years old (M=16.85)

o 52% female students


Data Analysis

Students’ conceptions of CC adaptationo Web-based survey (pre-test post-test design)o Conventional Content Analysis (students’ conceptions of CC adaptation)

o Inductive Codingo Intercoder agreement between 3 coders was 81%o Chi-square test (absolute frequency differences of CC adaptation conceptions)

Students’ ability to differentiate between CC adaptation and mitigationo Multiple choice instrument o T-test (absolute frequency differences of ability to differentiate between CC adaptation and

CC mitigation)


Instruments


Results: Students’ CC adaptation conceptionsIntervention group students


Results: Students’ CC adaptation conceptionsControl group students


Results: Students’ CC adaptation conceptionsMain findings

o Students’ conceptions of CC adaptation vary in degree of sophistication

o Students’ developed a more sophisticated understanding of CC adaptation after participating in the research-education cooperation

o Students‘ adopted other scientific concepts, like vulnerability, resilience, or transformation thinking

o The results encourage CC educators working on the issue of CC adaptation to create similar learning settings, like Generation F3 – Fit for Future


Results: Students’ ability to differentiate between CC adaptation and CC mitigation


Results: Students’ ability to differentiate between CC adaptation and CC mitigation

Main findings

o The data suggest that intervention group students could differentiate between CC adaptation and CC mitigation much better after they participated in the research-education cooperation

o No significant differences in answer frequencies for the control group during pre- and post-test were detected at all

o The ability to distinct between adaptation and mitigation behaviours can be supported using a similar educational design, like Generation F3 –Fit for Future


Discussion: Students’ conceptions

o It was difficult to draw meaning from the data in each case, and therefore the coding may add simplified logic to the complex qualitative data

o Adaptation is a complex issue, it cannot be taken for granted that without CC education lay people will grasp the idea of this concept (Bofferding and Kloser 2015)

o Vulnerability, resilience or transformation are crucial principles to understanding the strategy of CC adaptation in terms of its objectives and barriers (Folke et al. 2010)

o Control group students did not gain the advantage of working with CC experts (Bournot-Trites & Belanger 2005)


Discussion: Educational design


Effective CC education (Monroe et al. 2017)

Generation F3 – Fit for Future Implications for CC adaptation

Deliberative discussions that engage learners Group projects on CC adaptation Adaptation is a social process

Addressing misconceptions Moderate-constructivist theory Adaptation starts with students’

prior knowledge

Interaction with scientists 56 adaptation researchers & adaptation practitioners

Adaptation is context-specific

School and community projects Research-education cooperation framing

Adaptation is a collaborative process

Summary

o Educating CC adaptation needs learning settings that cross the borders of the classroom

o Educating CC adaptation requires interaction with CC experts

o Students‘ successfully expand their conceptions of CC adaptation

o More empirical research on CC adaptation and the role of CC education is needed


Outlook

Next research article:

o Building Teenagers’ Cognitive Adaptive Capacity through Climate Change Education: Linking Subjective and Objective Adaptation Appraisal

o Interested in collaboration?o E-Mail: [email protected]


mailto:[email protected]

ReferencesAnderson, A. (2012). Climate change education for mitigation and adaptation. Journal of Education for Sustainable Development, 6(2),191-206. doi: 10.1177/0973408212475199

Bournot-Trites, M., & Belanger, J. (2005). Ethical dilemmas facing action researchers. Journal of Educational Thought, 39(2), 197-215.

Folke, C., Carpenter, S. R., Walker, B., Scheffer, M., Chapin, T., & Rockström, J. (2010). Resilience thinking: integrating resilience, adaptability and transformability. Ecology and Society, 15(4). http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol15/iss4/art20/

Krahenbuhl, K. S. (2016). Student-centered Education and Constructivism: Challenges, Concerns, and Clarity for Teachers. The ClearingHouse: A Journal of Education Strategies, Issues and Ideas, 89(3), 97-105. doi: 10.1080/00098655.2016.1191311

Monroe, M. C., Plate, R. R., Oxarart, A., Bowers, A., & Chaves, W. A. (2017). Identifying effective climate change education strategies: a systematic review of the research. Environmental Education Research, 1-22. doi:10.1080/13504622.2017.1360842

Riede, M., Keller, L., Oberrauch, A., & Link, S. (2017). Climate change communication beyond the ‘ivory-tower’: A case study about thedevelopment, application, and evaluation of a science-education approach to communicate climate change to young people. Journal ofSustainability Education, 12, 1-24.

Zebisch M., Vaccaro R., Niedrist G., Schneiderbauer S., Streifeneder T., Weiß M., Troi A., … Bergonzi V. (Eds). (2018). Klimareport –Südtirol 2018. Bozen, Italien: Eurac Research


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teenagers expand their conceptions of climate change …€¦ · teenagers expand their conceptions...

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