Creating Art as a Climate Solution

• This video and article detail a collaboration between community members in New Haven using urban art and heat-absorbing paint to inspire and inform people.
• Students will learn about contributions to the urban heat island effect and hear from the Yale leaders who spearheaded this project.

Positives

• This video features two women of color with prominent positions at Yale University.
• This resource displays why an interdisciplinary approach helps tackle climate change.
  

Additional Prerequisites

• Students should understand the urban heat island effect, its causes, and how it impacts people in cities.
• Some students may need the terms urban art, mitigate, and others defined before watching the video and reading the article.

Differentiation

• Students can look at other measures to reduce the heat island effects, such as the one described in the Do Cities Need More Green Roofs? resource.
• This resource can supplement a lesson on the connection between buildings and greenhouse gas emissions.
• After viewing the mural, students can sketch their ideas for murals regarding climate change.
• This resource can support a classroom discussion on the merits of interdisciplinary collaboration and what other problems could be solved with this approach.