Assignment 5: Blog Post
It’s February already! I’ve been immersed in mountains of work in my job, the GDCAL course assignments, and trying to be a good mother/spouse that there is little time left over for reflecting on the learning that we, the students, have been involved in. The latest outbreak of COVID-19 in Happy Valley-Goose Bay (and the rest of the province) in Christmas also had a toll. My thoughts have usually been around what I did not get completed today so this blog was particularly challenging to write since I had not developed a blog outline in my head as I normally do. So, let’s just dive into the CALS501 design challenge process and our continuous learning.
The prototype that Team Braiding is conceptualizing is an online platform that gears climate knowledge and action towards high school youth, but it will primarily be a resource that teachers and other educators across Canada can use to educate and inspire climate action within their local communities. The platform would be a place for connecting with other youth and schools, climate change experts and advocates, Indigenous mentors, and teachings from Western and Indigenous knowledge systems.
The iterations evolved as we moved through the MACAL/GDCAL program. As we have learned through CALS502, framing and localized messaging are key to inspiring climate action or changing behaviours (Maibach et al., 2011; Hodson, 2019; Hine et al., 2016; Duplar et al., 2019; Moser, 2016; Armstrong et al., 2018; Krauß & Bremer, 2020). From real-world experience, there is also an understanding that targeting messaging through the schools, such as various presentations, indirectly gets key concepts into households and at times changes the behaviours within the home (S. Kippenhuck, personal communication, various team meetings). It is also known that teachers and other educators have a need for quality resources and do not have time to ensure that they have engaging materials for students (Canadian Teachers Federation [CTF], 2018 June; CTF, 2018 December). Therefore, my team has moved from a youth-centered resource to a resource for teachers and other educators focusing on youth.
Through these various iterations, Team Braiding has been struggling with how to incorporate Indigenous Traditional Knowledge and ways of knowing. We all agree that Indigenous ways of knowing needs to be included to be a holistic program. Ethically, we will have to ensure that no undue harm will come from the usage of the traditional knowledge as we learned from the Canada Tri-Council Policy Statement: Ethical Conduct for Research Involving Humans (TCPS 2) course and through my personal experience with NunatuKavut Community Council’s Research Advisory Committee. As Tuhiwai (2012) has indicated western research has been developed throughout history in a very colonial way which disregarded the Indigenous way of knowing and brought hardships to Indigenous peoples. Different ways of completing research are being recognized because of Indigenous resilience, self-determination, and reconciliation (Tuhiwai, 2012; Reed & Kendrick, 2018; Whitney et al., 2020; Fisher et al., 2021). Therefore, any Indigenous Traditional Knowledge that would be used within our prototype will need to be vetted and approved by the Indigenous organizations to ensure the risk of unintentional harm remains low. One way to mitigate this risk is to include Indigenous mentors that could be a virtual resource for those using the platform.
Another risk that Team Braiding has identified is how to ensure that school boards, schools, teachers, and other educators will use our online platform for educating and engaging youth as some may have strict policies regarding using online tools and apps. One way to mitigate this risk was to partner with an organization that already has a relationship with schools such as EcoSchools Canada.
Unfortunately, at the time of this blog Team Braiding was unable to complete the interviews with our chosen interviewees due to scheduling conflicts. Once these interviews are completed, we will be able to perform another design iteration and finalize our prototype based on feedback that will be received. Stay tuned!
References
Armstrong, A. K., Schuldt, J. P., & Krasny, M. E. (2018). Communicating climate change: A guide for educators. Cornell University Press. https://cornellopen.org/9781501730795/communicating-climate-change/
Canadian Teachers Federation. (2018, June 14). Let’s talk about the most elusive resource that teachers need. Blog Perspectives. https://www.ctf-fce.ca/blog-perspectives/lets-talk-about-the-most-elusive-resource-that-teachers-need/
Canadian Teachers Federation. (2018, December 4). Climate change: A unique learning moment. Blog Perspectives. https://www.ctf-fce.ca/blog-perspectives/climate-change-a-unique-learning-moment/
Dupar, M., McNamara, L., & Pacha, M. (2019). Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide. Climate and Development Knowledge Network. https://unfccc.int/sites/default/files/resource/Communicating%20climate%20change_Insights%20from%20CDKNs%20experience.pdf
Fischer, M., Maxwell, K., Nuunoq, Pedersen, H., Greeno, D. Jingwas, N., Blair, J.G., Hugu, S., Mustonen, T., Murtomӓki, E., & Mustonen, K. (2021). Empowering her guardians to nurture our Ocean’s future. Reviews in Fish Biology and Fisheries. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11160-021-09679-3
Hine, D. W., Phillips, W. J., Cooksey, R., Reser, J. P., Nunn, P., Marks, A. D. G., Loi, N. M., & Watt, S. E. (2016). Preaching to different choirs: How to motivate dismissive, uncommitted, and alarmed audiences to adapt to climate change? Global Environmental Change, 36, 1-11. https://go.openathens.net/redirector/royalroads.ca?url=https%3A%2F%2Fdoi.org%2F10.1016%2Fj.gloenvcha.2015.11.002
Hodson, J. (2019). An ecological model of climate marketing: A conceptual framework for understanding climate science related attitude and behavior change. Cogent Social Sciences, 5(1), 1625101. https://doi.org/10.1080/23311886.2019.1625101
Krauß, W., & Bremer, S. (2020). The role of place-based narratives of change in climate risk governance. Climate Risk Management, 28, 100221. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212096320300115
Maibach, E., Nisbet, M., & Weathers, M. (2011). Conveying the human implications of climate change: A climate change communication primer for public health professionals. George Mason University Center for Climate Change Communication. https://www.climatechangecommunication.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Climate-Communication-Primer-for-Public-Health-Professionals-1.pdf
Moser, S. C. (2016). Reflections on climate change communication research and practice in the second decade of the 21st century: What more is there to say? WIREs Climate Change, 7, 345-369. https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.403
Panel on Research Ethics. (n.d.). TCPS2: CORE-2022 (Course on Research Ethics). Government of Canada. http://tcps2core.ca/welcome
Reed, G., & Kendrick, A. (2018). Including Indigenous Knowledge Systems in Canada’s climate assessment (02 -25-2018v). Draft. https://moodle.royalroads.ca/moodle/pluginfile.php/858101/mod_book/chapter/197266/Reed%20Kendrick%20%282018%29%20Including%20Indigenous%20Knowledge%20Systems%20in%20Canadas%20Climate%20Assessment%20%2802%20-25-2018v%29.pdf
Tuhiwai, S. P. L. (2012). Decolonizing methodologies: Research and indigenous peoples. Zed Books. https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/royalroads-ebooks/detail.action?docID=1426837
Whitney, C. K., Frid, A., Edgar, B. K., Walkus, J., Siwallace, P., Siwallace, I. L., & Ban, N. C. (2020). “Like the plains people losing the buffalo”: Perceptions of climate change impacts, fisheries management, and adaptation actions by Indigenous peoples in coastal British Columbia, Canada. Ecology and Society, 25(4), 1–17. https://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol25/iss4/art33/