Using Digital Tools for Studying About and Addressing Climate Change

Abstract

Grounded in research-based examples, this chapter provides a resource for students, teachers, and researchers to critically engage with issues of climate change through leveraging the affordances of digital tools. In particular, the authors discuss the affordances and challenges of students using digital tools to address climate change. They also review research in this field, including studies on visualizations, analyzing information, social media, digital videos, digital role-play, video games, and virtual and augmented reality. The chapter describes how digital tools offer meaning-making possibilities for students to propose solutions to climate change through engaging multimodal narratives, as well as share their voices through digital activism. Considering that global climate change is perhaps the most serious problem human beings have ever faced, this chapter offers implications for curriculum and instruction to aid educators with designing digital projects for students to understand climate change and find ways to take a stand.