Teaching Climate Change in Primary English and Literacy Subjects: Multimodal Insights on Using Eco-documentaries

Conference: The European Conference on Education (ECE2021)
Title: Teaching Climate Change in Primary English and Literacy Subjects: Multimodal Insights on Using Eco-documentaries
Stream: Education, Sustainability & Society: Social Justice, Development & Political Movements
Presentation Type: Live-Stream Presentation
Authors:
Tingjia Wang, Hiroshima University, Japan

Abstract:

To design and implement climate change components into school education, multimodal literacy is a significant skill both teachers and students need to develop in order to critically consume factual and persuasive messages in climate change discourses in a range of media, such as eco-documentaries, news reports, webpages and so on. This presentation showcases a study that aims to explore two recurrently used communicative strategies in eco-documentaries for the purpose of communicating scientific and civil information to the public. Communicative strategies are typically presented as patterned visual representations in multimodal discourses. This study will explore two patterned, typical documentary representations of two key climate change themes respectively. One is the patterned representation of the Keeling Curve diagram, in relation to the visualisation of the invisible cause of climate change – the increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere; the other is the patterned representation of social rallies, in relation to the visual construction of the community identity “we”. Analysis of these two themes will demonstrate the value of teachers’ meta-awareness of multimodal literacy as a critical component in English and Literacy subjects in school education. It will further indicate that climate change should not be solely considered as a Science subject topic in school education. Resources like eco-documentaries are valuable materials to develop both students’ multimodal literacies and their social responsibilities in Literacy subjects. A practical metalanguage toolkit will be suggested for teachers to scaffold students’ critical thinking about climate change issues after consuming multimodal resources like eco-documentaries in class.

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