Visible Thinking and Discussion: Climate Change & Water
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Provided by: Bow Seat|Published on: December 11, 2025
Lesson PlansScientist Reviewed
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Scientist Reviewed This resource has been reviewed by SubjectToClimate's climate scientists and verified for scientific accuracy and up-to-date information. Learn about our review process →
Synopsis
- In this lesson from Bow Seat, students will read a text about climate change, complete an activity to reflect on how the article made them feel, and participate in a discussion to share their thoughts with other students.
- This lesson also suggests a culminating project, where students create art pieces to represent their climate change story.
- With the given text, students will understand how climate change impacts precipitation patterns, water quality, and sea level.
Subjects: Earth and Space Sciences, English Language Arts, Visual and Performing Arts
Authors: Bow Seat
Region:
Languages: English
Teaching Materials
Positives
- The "Color, Symbol, and Image" activity is a great way to help students begin to make sense of complicated feelings that may arise when reading an evocative text.
- The discussion method used in this lesson gets students talking to a variety of learners in their class, allowing them to gain insight into different perspectives.
Prerequisites
- Teachers should note that the information for the suggested culminating project is for a contest that ended in 2024; however, the link to the contest will go to the most recent one. Teachers should visit this link before teaching this lesson and determine whether or not the contest is appropriate as a project for their classroom.
- Students should already have a fairly good understanding of climate change.
Differentiation & Implementation
- Teachers can adapt this lesson to different reading levels by selecting different texts that are most appropriate for their readers.
- Teachers can use this activity to introduce the Inner/Outer Circle discussion method and establish this as a class norm going forward.
- This lesson can be used for a variety of subjects and topics by simply changing out the text that students read.
- If it is past the deadline of the contest, teachers can still have students create artwork to represent their climate change story. Teachers can also make connections to climate change data by showing students examples of climate change art, like this one by Jill Pelto.
- Students participating in the contest or a similar activity may require more knowledge about climate change to inform their submissions.
- Teachers can use this reading to lead into a lesson on sea level rise, water quality, or precipitation patterns.
This resource informs students about how the water system will change as the climate changes, including information about how weather patterns and bodies of water will change. Students will then focus on how they feel and what they are thinking after reading the article. Focusing on both the information and how students feel about it gives students space to process what they've learned, as well as any anxiety (or other feelings) that come up, which will help them understand and engage with the material. The information presented is accurate, and this resource is recommended for teaching.
Teaching Tips
Standards
Resource Type and Format
About the Partner Provider
Bow Seat: Creative Action for Conservation
Bow Seat Ocean Awareness Programs is a global nonprofit working at the intersection of environmental science and the arts. Bow Seat hosts the annual Ocean Awareness Contest, inviting students worldwide to create art, writing, film, and other creative media to learn about and speak up against the climate crisis. Since 2011, Bow Seat has engaged with nearly 30,000 students in all 50 U.S. states and 138 countries.
Scientist Reviewed
This resource has been reviewed by SubjectToClimate's climate scientists and verified for scientific accuracy and up-to-date information. Our review process ensures that every resource in our library reflects the current state of climate science.
Learn about our review process →
