Climate change and sustainability as context in maths teaching
Mathematical insight is key to understanding the world around us and our impact on it. A good maths education is vital to begin solving some the problems our world faces.
Following the publication of the Department for Education’s Sustainability and climate change strategy in April 2022, schools are increasingly including climate and sustainability within their development plans and looking for ways to engage students with those issues. Through MEI’s work supporting schools, we’ve been able to create free, high-quality resources for teachers to use in the classroom that do just that.
If you want to help solve many of the big problems facing the world, including climate change, you can really help if you start with a good understanding of maths. The science and engineering needed cannot progress without it. I know this from my own experience of working on climate modelling for many years. Now, as Chair of MEI, I am pleased that MEI is helping to provide climate change maths problems for students to work on.
Professor Vicky Pope, Chair of MEI
Resources
Here are a range of resources that use climate and sustainability as a context for mathematical learning.
Maths and Climate Change resources
A suite of climate change focused maths resources for both Core Maths and Key Stage 3 students.
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Where maths meets… Urban regeneration
Meet Susie and discover the mathematical skills that are required to complete an urban regeneration project.
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Where maths meets… Climate science
In this video you’ll hear from Sammie how choosing to study A level Mathematics was essential in enabling her to pursue a career in climate science.
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Where maths meets… ‘green’ engineering
In this video, find out how maths helped Ayantika develop a new material that can help fight climate change.
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Where’s the maths in that? Climate edition
The Where’s the maths in that resources, published by the AMSP, features a special Climate Edition.
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Your food’s carbon footprint
This AMSP-published Desmos activity aims to show how important maths is in understanding and communicating global issues.
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Visualising the Climate Crisis
These resources, published by the AMSP, highlight the environmental impact of fast fashion with a focus on the annual purchase of a Christmas jumper.
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MEI Inspired 2022 – Climate issues and maths
Our 2022 series of MEI Inspired webinars included a session on climate issues and maths.
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The NCETM Maths Podcast: Teaching about climate change in the maths classroom
Alistair and Tom from MEI talk about climate-based classroom resources and suggest tips for addressing social issues through maths
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Can teaching mathematics help save the planet?
An article published in Mathematics Teaching, the journal of the ATM.
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