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The Minister of State for Education, Annpurna Devi in a written reply to the Rajya Sabha informed that the concept of climate change has already been incorporated into the school curriculum. The Union Minister added climate change is a part of the curriculum or textbooks developed by the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) for Social Sciences/Geography for classes VII and XI.
What is Climate change?
A modification in the Earth’s climate brought as a result of atmospheric changes and interactions between the atmosphere and geologic, chemical, biological, and geographic factors within the Earth system, over a period of time, can be termed as climate change.
In simple terms, it refers to the global rise in average temperatures. According to international agencies like the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reiterate, based on studies that climate change is certainly a result of mindless human activities.
Impact of climate change
Climate change has led to an increase in temperature and extreme rainfall events in India. It has made the monsoon season stronger in the country.
Due to the impact of climate change, the Himalayan glaciers are melting at a faster rate, creating new lakes and expanding the existing ones. Increased temperature and precipitation levels also expose it to even greater risk of natural hazards, including the glacial lake outburst floods, like the one that hit Uttarakhand recently.
The impact of climate change can be witnessed in the loss of habitat of animals, drifting away of aquatic life from the equator, warming up of sea, forest fires, uneven distribution of rainfall, threat on natural vegetation, and more. This has a direct or indirect impact on every life form.
Teaching students about climate change
The topics on climate change are also a part of NCERT’s Science textbooks for classes VIII and IX and Biology textbook for class XII. Furthermore, NCERT has been organizing in-service teachers’ capacity-building programmes in the subjects Geography and Social Sciences to sensitize teachers over the issues related to climate change.
Taking aid of technology
India is stepping up to combat climate change. In doing so, it is equally important to sensitize people, especially the future generation, to involve their conscious and active participation. In this regard, the government has also taken the aid of technology in education.
In addition to including issues on climate change in the syllabus, live interactive sessions are also being conducted on Swayam Prabha, and PM eVidya channels. Further, the National Initiative for School Heads’ and Teachers’ Holistic Advancement (NISHTHA) learning modules for the elementary stage also include Environmental Science (EVS) concerns related to environmental protection in the module on EVS.
Approximately, 42 lakh teachers have already completed NISHTHA learning modules through offline and online mode. The training of teachers is an important step to educate and aware the students and the society as a whole. This is significant in process of proper implementation as well as sensitization of the issue of climate change.
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