Professional Learning for Busy Educators

What causes climate change?

Aside from some notable skeptics, everyone knows that it’s caused by greenhouse gases produced by human activity. It’s common knowledge today that emissions get trapped in our atmosphere and increase the planet’s temperature. But where do these gases come from?

NPR/IPSOS did a national poll recently and found that more than 8 in 10 teachers — and a similar majority of parents — support teaching kids about climate change.

But in reality, it's not always happening: Fewer than half of K-12 teachers told us that they talk about climate change with their children or students. Again, parents were about the same.

The top reason that teachers gave in our poll for not covering climate change? 65% said, "It's not related to the subjects I teach."

Yet at the same time, we also heard from teachers and education organizations who are introducing the topic in subjects from social studies to math to English language arts, and at every grade level, from preschool on up.