Taking Current Climate Change Research to the Classroom—The “Will Hermit Crabs Go Hungry in Future Oceans?” Project

Climate change and its consequences at environmental, social and economic level will affect all of us, in particular the children of today who are the world’s citizens of tomorrow. However, the causes, consequences and mitigating measures to counteract climate change are not currently part of the regular primary or lower secondary school curriculum in the UK. With the evident lack of practical climate change-based school activities for the UK curriculum in mind, this report describes an outreach project that takes authentic up-to-date research to the classroom with the aim to provide an example to cover this topic. The project focuses on the effects of ocean acidification and the drop of ocean pH on the foraging ability of hermit crabs. Besides a detailed description of the project set-up, this report highlights scientific as well as educational outcomes. The classroom-based experimental sessions yielded a significant scientific result, showing that the hermit crabs’ ability to locate food is significantly impaired by pH conditions expected for the year 2100. Combining theoretical and practical parts, the project reached the pupils through different channels and therefore made every child take home the message in their own way, at the same time adding to their key skills in teamwork and effective communication. We could further observe a clear gain in knowledge and confidence with regards to the scientific skills obtained through this project. Professional scientists delivering the sessions alongside school teaching staff also served as positive role models to foster the children’s future aspirations for science.