Teaching Strategies:

• Lessons should highlight the intersectionality of environmental education and social justice topics.

• Students should engage with real-world environmental and social justice issues. Help students feel empowered to take action, especially within their community. Partner with local organizations to address environmental or social justice issues in the classroom. Use storytelling as a way to engage students emotionally with the issues of ecojustice.

• Challenge students to critically analyze the world around them and question existing social and environmental systems.

Implementation:

I would have my students complete a research project regarding various topics, including:

• How climate change disproportionately affects marginalized communities, or how environmental deterioration can lead to social inequity

• The effects of pollution on local communities or research the environmental impact of industrial practices, as well as working on potential solutions.

• Advocating for policy changes, participating in protests, or creating art or media that raises awareness about critical social and environmental issues.

• The root causes of environmental deterioration and social inequalities.

I would have guest speakers come in and/or have students read first-person accounts from people/communities directly affected by environmental and social injustices. I would also create a service-learning project where students engage in hands-on activities that promote sustainability or social justice. Students could work on projects like planting trees, reducing waste at school, or creating awareness campaigns.  They could also work with local environmental groups or participate in sustainability initiatives that directly impact their community.

Implementation:

I would have students relate real-world problems to what we learn in class.  I would have them collaborate to connect topics like environmental racism and climate change to what we learn about in our class. I would also encourage open discussions where students can discuss and reflect on connections between science, sustainability, and justice. I would also have them look into and research how their other classes tie into ecojustice and what we are learning in our class. I would have them find topics that connect across the disciplines. I would also have them complete a project about how to use the disciplines under STEM (or maybe any other subject area) to help their communities with an environmental problem they are currently facing or may face in the future. Such as "If your community was suddenly unable to find a source of clean water, what could you do to help remedy this problem?" I would make it more or less challenging based on grade level.

Teaching Strategies:

• Help students engage with real-world issues and apply them to STEM concepts. To allow students to explore issues and critically analyze from multiple perspectives.

• Encourage students to question and examine how science and mathematics as a type of knowledge is suspect to bias just as other knowledge. Allow students to explore issues that are personally meaningful to them.

• Encourage collaborative learning: students work together to address complex issues

• Integrate discussions of environmental and social justice into the STEM curriculum. Guide students to explore how STEM can be a tool to tackle the inequalities

Teaching Strategies:

• Help students grasp the intersections between environmental problems, such as pollution and climate change, and social issues, such as race; poverty; and inequality.

• Encourage students to reflect on their own positions within society. Have them question how their identities, values, and actions relate to environmental and social justice.

• Engage both the students and the community in the service-learning process. Collaborate with local organizations and community members.

Implementation

Whether I am in an urban school or not, there are many strategies in this paper I can use in my future classroom. I would have my students participate in service projects that would aim to solve local environmental problems. It could be urban gardening, waste reduction, environmental advocacy. I would make sure to address social justice concerns, such as access to green spaces. I would have them do some kind of discussion (possibly by socratic seminar) or little writing activity for them to reflect on their positions in society. I would ask them to look into how their identities, values, and actions connect to ecojustice. I would make sure to have a lot of hands-on community-based activities. I would try to incorporate this into the labs they would need to complete for the class. I would have them critically examine the systems that contribute to environmental and social inequities. I would make sure that the students have the ability to take control of their learning process. I would give them chances to make decisions and take more responsibility for their projects. I would also have them reflect on their learning throughout the course. I would have them look back to see if they recognize any personal growth regarding their roles in addressing environmental and social issues.

Implementation:

I would use hands-on projects that allow students to connect what they have learned in the classroom with their lives outside of it. I would also work with teachers from other subject areas to design projects that would connect to each other. The way my high school history and english teachers used to connect their lessons to each other. ex: teaching about the 1920’s in history when we were reading The Great Gatsby in english. I would love to hold more outside labs where students can look at nature and possibly get real-world examples for research projects about ecojustice. I would help my students connect local issues with global ones. I would help them find ways to take action on a local level to support global causes.

Teaching Strategies:

• Connect classroom learning with local community issues.

• Integrate multiple subjects to create a more comprehensive understanding of the environmental and social justice issues.

• Collaborative teaching across subject areas.

• Experiential learning involving students directly in solving real-world issues. Take students out into the world for field-based learning opportunities.

• Ongoing professional development is crucial in developing their ability to implement ecojustice and community-based learning practices.

Teaching Strategies:

• Use climate justice as a framework for stem learning

• Engage in long-term reciprocally beneficial community partnerships

• Center diverse voices from the climate justice movement. Center student voices and experiences

• Critically examine the intersections of social justice, environmental, and climate systems

• Analyze multiple conceptualizations of justice

• Focus on solutions, involvement, and action at different societal levels

• Include alternative ways of knowing

Implementation:

I would have students research a particular climate or environmental justice topic. Have them relate their topic to course content. This website is a toolkit, so I would let the students review/use the links provided that relate to their topic. Specifically, I would like to use/create case studies for my students to work on and help illustrate the concepts of climate justice. I would also make a project where the students would have to write a mock letter/email to a government official or create a mock advocacy campaign for an environmental issue their community faces. It could also be a project to advocate for communities that disproportionately face environmental issues. I would make it a project that if they wanted to actually send it out or use it in real life, they could.