Fossil

The same administration sending ICE to terrorize communities, suppressing voting rights, and starting wars is contributing to dangerous heat waves, threatening the safety of millions in parts of the United States and around the world. Fossil fuel extraction helps turn annual heat (and snow, fires, and rain storms) into extreme weather. Addressing this crisis requires getting to the root causes. But the media continues to describe the current events out of context. Journalist John Vaillant, author of Fire Weather: On the Front Lines of a Burning World, says: [The] frankly suicidal loyalty to the status quo of keeping fossil fuels preeminent in our energy system is creating an increasingly unlivable situation . . . What we’re living in right now is an increasingly shrill dissonance between the fact of climate change, the science of climate change . . . and the governments who . . . [serve] the petroleum industry and the investors who are dependent on keeping them in business. The climate crisis threatens all our students’ lives. As media limits references to climate change, it is time to break that silence in classrooms so that young people study the climate and learn how to organize for a safe future. Teach Climate Justice Below are free lessons and other resources. Green New Deal Lesson for Middle and High School Students As we rebuild, we must restore the Green New Deal promise of public land and water use. — Kaniela Ing, Green New Deal Network We offer a free lesson on the New Deal of the 1930s, which opens students’ minds to the possibilities of a Green New Deal today. The lesson, “From the New Deal to the Green New Deal: Stories of Crisis and Possibility,” is by Suzanna Kassouf, Matt Reed, Tim Swinehart, Ursula Wolfe-Rocca, and Bill Bigelow. The Climate Crisis Trial: A Role Play on the Roots of Global Warming This is one of those lessons teachers dream about where students are walking out the door still discussing and debating. — Brett Benson, middle school teacher, Omaha, Nebraska Who — or what — is to blame for the terrible effects of the climate crisis? This trial role play by Bill Bigelow helps students understand the complicated factors involved. The Thingamabob Game: A Simulation on Capitalism vs. the Climate I love this lesson because it opens the door to conversations about capitalism, mass production, environmental responsibility, and what exactly drives this type of decision making in the real world. This is a lesson that I have and will continue to use every school year! — Taylor Newport, high school social studies teacher, South Bend, Indiana Bill Bigelow’s The Thingamabob Game helps students grasp the essential relationship between climate and capitalism. And coming to this realization is not merely academic. How we think about solving the climate crisis depends, in large part, on what we think is causing it. Climate Crisis Timeline The timeline allowed [students] to see the climate crisis as a story with authors, choices, and consequences — and one in which they have a role to play. —Kari Matthies, high school special education teacher, Red Wing, Minnesota This timeline of the climate crisis, created by Mimi Eisen and Ursula Wolfe-Rocca, traces its roots from European colonial expansion and racial capitalism to present-day fossil fuel industry and government projects that exploit and destroy the Earth in the name of maximum profit. It also emphasizes moments and movements of resistance and activism that inform climate justice work today. Teaching Guide A People’s Curriculum for the Earth is a collection of articles, lessons, stories, poems, and graphics to breathe life into teaching for environmental justice. The book features some of the best articles from Rethinking Schools magazine, alongside classroom-friendly readings on climate change, energy, water, food, and pollution — as well as on people working to make things better. #TeachTruth About the Climate Crisis Legislators in at least 44 states have passed laws — or are attempting to pass laws — to prohibit teachers from putting racism at the center of their classroom inquiry about the nature of U.S. society. It is now a crime for a teacher in Iowa, for example, to suggest that the United States is “fundamentally or systematically” racist. But the hailstorm of legislation attacking anti-racist education has a less obvious target: teaching about the environment and about climate change. Continue reading this Rethinking Schools article by Bill Bigelow. Books for Young People Teaching for Change’s Social Justice Books offers a carefully selected list of books for pre-K–12 on the environment and climate justice, and teaching guides. News In a DemocracyNow! interview on July 6, 2026, climate journalist David Wallace-Wells said, “Global warming is accelerating past thresholds that we used to consider unacceptable. There are a lot of questions about why we haven’t prepared adequately for these heat waves.” He argues that it is still possible to retrofit the planet to mitigate the climate catastrophe. Listen to the full interview below. Share Your Story We want to hear from teachers who have used Zinn Education Project resources to teach about climate change in any subject. Thanks to donations by an author and publishers, in appreciation for your teaching story, we will send you a copy of Paradise on Fire by Jewell Parker Rhodes, The World We Need: Stories and Lessons from America’s Unsung Environmental Movement by Audrea Lim, or We Are the Middle of Forever: Indigenous Voices from Turtle Island on the Changing Earth edited by Dahr Jamail and Stan Rushworth. Twitter Google plus LinkedIn