The Train-the-Trainer initiative supports high school teachers and youth facilitators to build climate literacy among high school learners and unemployed youth. Through capacity-building workshops, the initiative aims to share up-to-date climate change knowledge, practical teaching resources and inspiration to help participants communicate climate science and bring it to life in learning environments. Each year, we aim to host two Train-the-Trainer events: one in the Western Cape and one in another South African province, extending access to climate education resources and strengthening climate literacy across the country.
Useful Climate Change Resources
Climate change is an increasingly important part of education in South Africa, allowing learners to explore how a changing climate affects people, ecosystems and communities – and what we can do about it. From changing rainfall patterns and rising temperatures to water security, biodiversity loss and extreme weather events, climate change is already influencing our daily lives and the world around us. Helping learners understand these changes can build awareness, encourage critical thinking and inspire them to consider how we can respond to climate change in ways that support people and the environment.
This booklet brings together a selection of climate change resources developed for, or relevant to, South African teachers and learners. These resources offer accessible information and locally relevant perspectives to help you bring climate change to life in the classroom.
Whether you are introducing climate change for the first time or looking for new ways to explore the topic with your learners, we hope this collection provides a useful starting point. Download the booklet here or find the resources below.
Books and Comics
- Smart Living Handbook
- Stories of social (in)equity in nature-based solutions
- Everyday stories of climate change SA
- Survive the Century
Websites
- What is climate change? A really simple guide
- Skeptical Science: getting skeptical about global warming skepticism
Podcasts and Videos
Calculators
Education Resources
- Keep It Cool: climate change education resources
- Climate change in the classroom: UNESCO course for secondary teachers on climate change education for sustainable development
- Education and climate change: learning to act for people and planet
- Greening curriculum guidance: teaching and learning for climate action
- NRF-SAEON Education. National Research Foundation – South African Environmental Observation Network
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The Climate Impact Explorer provides maps and graphs showing how climate impacts may change over time under different levels of global warming and emissions scenarios.
Climate Reanalyzer is a website that provides interactive maps and visualisations of weather and climate data.
The Copernicus Climate Data Store is the European Union's Copernicus platform for accessing climate and weather datasets.
JetStream (NOAA National Weather Service) is the online school for weather offering illustrated lessons on topics such as wind, clouds, thunderstorms, lightning, tornadoes, tropical storms and flooding, together with hands-on Learning Lessons made up of simple experiments and demonstrations.
The South African Weather Service (SAWS) website is the official source of weather forecasts and warnings for South Africa. It also provides information on climate, aviation, air quality, marine conditions and research, and gives access to South African climate information and data, including publications such as the Daily Weather Bulletin and the Climate Summary of South Africa.
Windy is an interactive weather map that allows users to explore weather conditions and forecasts visually. It provides maps for variables such as wind, temperature, rain, pressure and waves, and allows users to compare different weather forecast models.
The UNESCO Ocean Literacy Portal is an online platform from UNESCO's Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission that brings together a wide range of tools and resources for sharing ocean knowledge.
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