An educational pack to help primary school children unravel the mysteries of climate change has been developed by Forestry Commission Wales.
The climate change pack will be launched in south Wales during a week-long event starting on 21 March to celebrate Climate Week.
Billed as Britain’s biggest environmental occasion, Climate Week is backed by celebrities and politicians including Prime Minister David Cameron, former US vice-President Al Gore and television presenter Michael Palin.
The Commission’s Woodlands for Learning (WfL) team have been offering woodland visits covering climate change to schools throughout Wales since September 2010.
They have now put together a range of fun hands-on activities so that teachers can use their local woodland or school grounds to explain the complex and difficult subject and show how trees can help.
Each activity in the pack links directly to the Key Stage 2 curriculum for Science, Geography, Education for Sustainable Development and Global Citizenship and Personal and Social Skills.
The packs include information about carbon storage, the importance of planting trees to tackle climate change and using wood products to reduce our CO2 emissions.
The team developed the pack after studying the conclusions from their 2009 Children’s Conference on Trees, Woodlands and Climate Change, which found that children needed to know more about the threat of global warming.
Education Officer Karen Clarke said, “We have held successful trials of the pack and will be arranging teacher training days to explain how to use the activities and resource cards.
“We hope the pack will be available to download free from the FC Wales website by the end of March.”
Over the coming year activities and visits will be developed for other age groups and Education Officer-led climate change visits will be offered throughout Wales.
