This week, we had the wonderful opportunity to spend time at Northmoor Library, engaging in a unique and exciting project. We were there as part of a special collaboration, known as the British Science Association Community Buddy Programme, which brings together Manchester Metropolitan University and Oldham Libraries.
Our mission was a challenging yet important one: to spark interest and awareness about climate change among young children. To achieve this, we decided to use a tool that is both familiar and beloved by many of them—Minecraft. By leveraging this popular game, we aimed to make the concept of climate change more accessible and understandable to the kids, hoping to inspire them to think more about the environment and how they can help protect it.
We started each session watching a short video from Skyworks, This short film about green issues and sustainability generally was put together entirely from video footage filmed by Skyworks from around the world, and uses the imagery to tell the story of a King and his kingdom as it experiences pollution and climate change.
After the children learned the basics of climate change, we gave them a fun task: to create their own future homes in the game Minecraft. This wasn’t just about building cool houses; it was a way for them to think about and talk about their ideas. They added things like solar panels for clean energy and green roofs to help the environment, explaining why these were important.
This activity made them think about how we can make our world better by using smart, earth-friendly designs in our homes.
