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Provided by: MIT Climate Action Through Education |Published on: January 28, 2025
Lesson Plans
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Synopsis
This lesson plan looks at the recent history of climate change and science, focusing on environmental disasters caused by pesticides and oil spills, the history of Earth Day, and the role of Exxon Mobile and corporate greed in climate uncertainty.
Students will watch and read speeches from influential environmentalists, analyze primary sources, and create a civic action project.
Seeing the passion behind the first Earth Day and other environmental movements throughout history can inspire students to affect change.
This lesson and the Frontline documentary in particular do an excellent job of showing potential motivation for dissent amongst scientists and the role of Big Oil in climate science.
Prerequisites
The UpFront article for Part 1 of the Climate Change and Earth Day Worksheet is behind a paywall. Additionally, in the worksheet, students will have to request access to Dennis Hayes's Speech from the first Earth Day in 1970.
Before the Primary Source Exercise, students may need the acronym BLM defined in this context, as they may only know it as the Black Lives Matter movement.
Differentiation & Implementation
After watching the PBS documentary, students can research BP's role in and motives behind the carbon footprint and other rhetoric that focuses on individual actions and ignores systemic issues.
Given the sections about the history of Earth Day, this is a great Earth Day resource for students in history classes.
