Open Access

Johannes Schulz, Jan Christoph Schubert, Steffen Höhnle, Ulrike Ohl

• Geography education integrates perspectives from the natural and social sciences and is therefore particularly promising for Climate Change Education. Against this background, and in view of the encouraging potential of Inquiry-based Learning in climate education, a geographical-scientific propaedeutic seminar on climate change in upper secondary schools in Germany (Bavaria) was developed. This 18-month intervention was aimed at facilitating integration of scientific inquiry with local climate challenges. For the present study, the effects of the seminar on students’ self-assessed certainty, risk perception, and interests, each regarding anthropogenic climate change, were investigated in a quasi-experimental pre-post-test design with an experimental group (N = 89) and a control group (N = 71). Mixed-design ANOVAs and ANCOVAs with repeated measures revealed positive effects of the treatment group compared to the control group, with moderate effect sizes for certainty and interest and aGeography education integrates perspectives from the natural and social sciences and is therefore particularly promising for Climate Change Education. Against this background, and in view of the encouraging potential of Inquiry-based Learning in climate education, a geographical-scientific propaedeutic seminar on climate change in upper secondary schools in Germany (Bavaria) was developed. This 18-month intervention was aimed at facilitating integration of scientific inquiry with local climate challenges. For the present study, the effects of the seminar on students’ self-assessed certainty, risk perception, and interests, each regarding anthropogenic climate change, were investigated in a quasi-experimental pre-post-test design with an experimental group (N = 89) and a control group (N = 71). Mixed-design ANOVAs and ANCOVAs with repeated measures revealed positive effects of the treatment group compared to the control group, with moderate effect sizes for certainty and interest and a small effect size for risk perception. These results indicate that integrating locally anchored, long-term, inquiry-based approaches into geography education can effectively foster components of climate science literacy to address the educational and societal challenges of climate change.…