Approaches to Foster Young Children’s Engagement with Climate Action: A Sco** Review

Abstract

Climate change poses a significant risk to young children (birth to eight years). Early childhood education and care is believed to play a pivotal role in guaranteeing young children’s understanding of sustainability issues and climate change. Yet how education translates into climate action in early childhood is still unknown, and there is a need for research to explore the approaches that may be deployed to foster young children’s engagement with climate action. This sco** review aims to identify and describe the existing literature highlighting the approaches used in early childhood education to foster climate action amongst young children; map the gaps in this emerging field of inquiry; and make recommendations for areas of future research to address this problem. These findings offer potential priorities for educators, researchers and policymakers to develop climate change education programmes that are meaningful to young children in the early years. Based on the findings, areas for interventions related to climate literacy and climate change education, which may be helpful in raising awareness of climate change among young children, will be outlined.

1. Introduction

Article 1 of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) [1] defines anthropogenic climate change as “a change of climate which is attributed directly or indirectly to human activity that alters the composition of the global atmosphere and which is in addition to natural climate variability observed over comparable time periods.” Due to extreme climatic changes that are influenced by anthropogenic causes, floods, droughts, cyclones, heatwaves, and infectious diseases are intensifying in frequency and severity, and are affecting communities worldwide, threatening the lives of many. Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 13 calls for individuals to “take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts” but it does not have any numerical target for limiting global temperature rise [2]. Adaptation actions to prevent biodiversity losses from continuing unabated are necessary (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [IPCC]) [3]. Yet the resources available to enact the much-needed change are limited. This means that better understanding is needed around the benefits of adoptive climate actions, compared to the costs of failing to take action. Gaining this understanding is challenging for political, environmental and economic reasons. In economic terms, the direct and indirect cost of the climate crisis across the globe is estimated to cost the global economy USD 178 trillion over the next 50 years, compared to the USD 43 trillion that could be gained by transitioning to net-zero within the same timeframe [4]. While climate change harms biodiversity and the economy, there are a whole host of other problems that need to be addressed. The World Bank reports that by the year 2030 internal migration due to climate change will become a widespread phenomenon, and by 2050, 216 million people will have migrated within their own country due to harsh climatic conditions [5]. Therefore, countries need to take urgent action to implement policies that could help reduce greenhouse emissions, address poverty and inequality, and enable more sustainable lives [5,6].

The impacts of climate change, although devastating, will not affect everyone equally. Children from birth to eight years of age are more vulnerable than adults to the impacts of climate change, and children in low- and middle-income countries are bearing significantly higher impacts of the climate crisis, derailing a lifetime of opportunities [7]. Therefore, climate change is not just an environmental and economic threat, but it is also a threat to children’s rights, health and wellbeing [7,8,9]. It is estimated that current and future generations of children and vulnerable communities are at greater risk of experiencing the negative impacts of climate change, leading to negative health and economic outcomes both for the individual and for broader society [3]. Left unchecked, climate change puts children’s lives at increased risk, partly due to the changes to physical health and the availability of resources. If the IPCC estimates are correct, unless immediate action is taken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and limit warming to close to 1.5 °C, humanity will experience the catastrophic impacts of climate change sooner, rather than later [3]. In the absence of effective interventions, the global burden of climate change will continue to climb.

Climate Change Education in Early Childhood

Dealing with climate change requires individual and collective climate action. In this paper, climate action describes the behaviour or action enacted by an individual or a group of individuals aimed at mitigating and adapting to the impacts of climate change. Climate action largely focuses on mitigating action to reduce greenhouse emissions through personal action and policy support, efforts to increase resilience, and adaptive capacity to the consequences of the impacts of a changed climate, such as extreme weather events [10]. Governments can save lives by investing in pro-environmental measures and accelerating actions that improve human health and security. Still, the call for policies and programmes designed to respond to the current crisis and its future consequences continues [11].

Several international policy documents recognise education as a critical and effective tool in hel** citizens become climate-resilient by learning to understand and address the impacts of climate change via the development of knowledge, values, skills, behaviours and attitudes that enable them to take collective climate action to protect the biosphere [2,3,12,13,14,15]. In fact, education has been widely recognised for its unique potential to facilitate citizens’ active engagement in a democratic process and to reduce inequalities [16,17,18]. UNESCO (2015) has identified Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) as a main tool to promote a sustainable future for humanity and the planet [2]. The UN has emphasised that in order to be able to achieve the SDGs, individuals need eight key competencies, including systems-thinking, anticipatory, normative, strategic, collaboration, critical-thinking, self-awareness and integrated problem-solving competencies [19]. These competencies need to be adjusted to meet the needs and maturity of individuals. Through the achievement of these competencies, children will have clear opportunities to flourish. As such, ESD reorients education and learning by creating opportunities for learners of all ages to acquire the knowledge, skills, values, behaviours and attitudes needed for sustainable living.

Like ESD, climate change education (CCE) is acknowledged as important for achieving a sustainable future for all [20]. Specifically, “Addressing climate change requires citizens who understand the science and are willing to take action to improve the environment” [13] (p. 5). In a society whose future is marked by the uncertainties brought about by the triple planetary crisis—climate change, pollution and biodiversity loss, education, across all sectors, is key to transforming society towards sustainability. Even though education can play a major role in climate change adaptation and it contributes relatively very little to global emissions [21], there is little agreement about what CCE should look like [17]. Many countries have not made CCE a priority and teachers lack the resources and training to address issues around climate change with young children [22]. Furthermore, despite the fact that the importance of education for empowering individuals to take climate action has been widely recognised in international documents, current approaches to CCE focus attention on upper-secondary, post-secondary and higher education, rather than on early childhood education and care (ECEC) and/or primary education [22,23]. As climate change continues to adversely impact the educational outcomes of many children, particularly the most vulnerable children [24], questions around what CCE is, what it needs to accomplish and which approaches are sufficient to achieve its goals remain [17]. In this context, adapting to climate change requires an overhaul of education systems worldwide to prepare children to be able to adapt to and mitigate the uncertainties brought about by climate change, sooner rather than later.

Early childhood, the period from birth until eight years of age, is a significant period for human development, children’s rights, and their future educational, economic and health prospects, and ultimately, for societal flourishing [9]. Early investments in CCE can give children the tools necessary to build resilience, advance climate mitigation and adaptation, and empower families to take climate action and become more resilient to climate shocks [24]. ECEC, the education of children starting at birth until age eight, is based on relationships and care. Young children possess unique perspectives and untapped potential to influence their communities. Their ability to absorb information, form attitudes, and engage in conversations with peers, family, and community members can contribute to raising awareness and fostering positive behavioural changes. Finding new ways to educate children to reduce the negative consequences of climate change is a critical role of education research and policy [21]. Exploring how young children facilitate engagement with climate issues within their communities can shed light on their role as agents of change, the hallmark of CCE in ECEC [25,26]. Yet, there is a dearth of research that provides an overview of CCE initiatives, particularly in ECEC [22]. Significant investment in education and teacher training to enable children to develop skills to create a sustainable future, and to adapt to climate change and build resilience strategies to effectively address climate risks is required [17,27].

Despite the promotion of CCE on an international level and in some curricula, there are several challenges for educators. The first challenge is that there is not enough professional learning available, particularly that shows how CCE can come together under the ESD umbrella for use in the ECEC classrooms. Furthermore, whenever such knowledge is available, it is often presented in the English language, making it difficult for non-English speakers to access and implement it in practice. Understanding the strategies and approaches employed in teaching young children about the climate crisis is essential for develo** effective educational interventions. The second challenge is that there are few examples of sustained climate change curricula developed for classroom implementation in ECEC. By identifying successful approaches, such as hands-on activities and interactive learning, while using age-appropriate materials, and by designing appropriate teaching training programs, educators and policymakers can enhance the effectiveness of climate education programs and curricula. Finally, there are almost no examples of how to begin to introduce CCE into formal learning contexts with younger children. Research conducted in Malta by Spiteri and Pace [28] suggests that children aged four to seven years hold some understanding of climate change based on personal experience but they also hold misconceptions. Such misconceptions may persist into adulthood unless action is taken to teach children about the adaptation and mitigation measures in relation to climate change from a young age.

Internationally, almost all countries are addressing CCE, with public awareness being the most common educational approach adopted, with more focus on cognitive learning rather than on emotional, social or behavioural learning at all education levels [29]. Still, very few countries have concrete action plans to achieve this [15,17,30]. Awareness without providing the means to act would be hugely disempowering and would not teach children the knowledge, skills, values, behaviours and attitudes they need to deal with the climate crisis. It is not enough for education systems to provide only subject specific content. Rather, education needs to help children create links between climate issues and mitigation and adaptation measures [17,26]. To effectively transform pro-environmental behaviour, education systems need to (a) engage in a systematic approach that helps children understand the complexity of the world around them, and (b) educate them to take climate action and increase their sense of self-efficacy. The question as to which approaches may be deployed to foster young children’s (up to age eight) engagement with climate action remains. This sco** review is a first attempt to fill this gap.

2. Materials and Methods

Climate action in early childhood is an emerging field of research. Since little is known about the topic, a sco** review was undertaken to generate an overview of the literature in early childhood research in relation to young children and climate change, to identify the knowledge gaps in the field [31,32]. Due to the emerging and interdisciplinary nature of the current study, and since the research question incorporates details about the study population (young children under age eight), interventions (approaches that encourage children to take action) and outcomes (climate action), [33], a sco** review was deemed appropriate as it can identify and bring together research from different fields and disciplines related to early childhood education and sustainability and provide an understanding of how such approaches may, or may not, be translated to encourage young children to take climate action.

2.1. Eligibility Criteria

Population: sample aged birth—8 years, or if the mean or median sample age fell within this range;

Intervention: approaches to foster young children’s engagement in climate action;

Outcomes: arts-based and nature-based activities, programmes and interventions in relation to climate change action;

Context: global, and all geographic regions were considered.

Studies were excluded if they reported arts-based and nature-based activities, programmes and interventions in relation to climate change activism in a language other than English. The exclusion criteria were based on the need of this sco** review to compile a thorough cross-disciplinary account of the literature at these two specific intersections: (1) involved children, (2) mentioned CCE, and (3) focused on a play-based pedagogy, as the ideal pedagogical approach to ECEC. As such, excluded articles that did not meet criteria were those that only involved participants above the age of eight years, spoke of CCE without mentioning pedagogical approaches to engage young children in climate action, or only touched on the interventions from after a climate-related catastrophe, such as floods. Much of the work presented here arose from the fields of early childhood research and environmental education research. However, some work from sociology and interdisciplinary social sciences was also included.

2.2. Protocol

A sco** review was conducted to meet the search objectives of this study. Sco** reviews are useful when the goal is to map the current state of knowledge in a specific research area [32,34]; in the case of this study, the area of interest was approaches that may foster climate action in early childhood. Due to the emerging nature of research examining young children’s engagement with climate action, a sco** review is appropriate as it can identify interdisciplinary research.

This sco** review was conducted in accordance with the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI), Adelaide, Australia, methodology for sco** reviews [33]. It considered studies reporting on young children (up to eight years of age). The search results for this review were reported using the 2018 Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Sco** Reviews (PRISMA-ScR) checklist (Appendix 1) [35]. Additionally, any updates from the 2020 PRISMA statement for systematic reviews [36] were included if and when relevant.

2.3. Inclusion and Exclusion Criteria

This sco** review focuses on studies that present approaches that may be deployed to foster children’s engagement in climate action in ECEC, as presented in the literature. Specifically, it considered studies that reported on children (aged birth–8 years). The age limit was operationally defined in accordance with Article 1, in the UNCRC [37], which describes a child as any human being under the age of 18 years, unless under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier.

This review considered primarily studies between 2 January 2008, and 16 July 2023, in English, from around the world. The lower date limit was selected given that the importance of ECEC in relation to sustainability issues started gaining momentum since the beginning of the 21st century with the publication of the Gothenburg recommendations for early childhood education [38], followed by the publication of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals [2].

Presenting a review of available evidence published in high-quality journal archives as presented in systematic reviews would not fit the scope of this article. The aim here is rather to explore and map the field to understand the topic from a broader perspective, and to present an overview of both the ‘grey’ and ‘white’ peer-reviewed literature in the field [31]. Therefore, this sco** review incorporates, but is not limited to, qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods studies, conference papers, books and reports, rather than identifying and presenting the highest-quality evidence. Furthermore, no quality assessment was conducted and studies were not excluded based on quality. Any empirical studies that reported on both children and adults were included only if children were reported on separately. Studies in languages other than English were not included in this review, the implications of which are discussed in the limitations section below.

2.4. Search Strategy

Searches were conducted in seven academic databases (ERIC, Education source, PubMed, PsycInfo, Google Scholar, Scopus and Web of Science) and three unpublished/grey literature databases (ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, GreyLit.org, and OpenGrey) on 16 July 2023. Much of the grey literature cited in articles identified from the academic databases was not identified through the grey literature databases and the number of articles identified was low. Therefore, a backward reference section was conducted to identify articles and the grey literature on 18 August 2023. An additional search was conducted on 8 September 2023, to identify more studies.

Search terms for this review were sourced from the definitions of climate action, early childhood education, and climate change education. The paired search terms used were: ‘children’, ‘child’, ‘kid’, ‘school children’, ‘school age’, ‘early childhood’, ‘early childhood education’, ‘pedagogy’, ‘nature’, ‘arts’, ‘play’ AND ‘climate’ or ‘climate action’. A search for additional papers not found in the primary search, but that may have been cited by relevant studies that had been reviewed, was conducted. Only papers published in the English language within a recent 15-year publication time frame (2008–2023) were included.

Table 1. Search-term strategy employed in this review.

Search Number	Search Terms
#1	noft(‘climate change’) OR noft(‘climate action’)
#2	noft(‘children’) OR noft(‘early childhood’) OR noft(‘early childhood education’) OR noft(‘pedagogy’) OR noft(‘nature’) OR noft(‘arts’) OR noft(‘play’)
#3	noft(‘kid’) OR noft(‘school children’), OR noft(‘school age’)
	#1 AND #2 AND #3

Noft = not full text (i.e., only abstract, title, and keywords).

shows the review protocol following guidance from Martin et al., (2020) [39].

2.5. Study Selection Process

All papers from highly ranked and peer-reviewed journals, as well as the ‘grey’ and ‘white’ literature, that reported on methodological approaches to teaching children about climate change and engaging them in climate action met the inclusion criteria for this study and were downloaded and stored in a drive. After duplicates were removed, titles and abstracts were screened for assessment against the inclusion criteria. An additional, independent reviewer screened the studies for relevance with the inclusion criteria. Next, the full texts of selected citations were assessed in detail against the inclusion criteria and data were extracted from these papers. Data extracted included that of the study samples, aims, methods, intervention types, intervention theoretical basis, outcomes, and results relevant to the current research question. Where required, authors were contacted for further information about missing data.

The results of the search and screening are presented in a Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses Extension for Sco** Reviews (PRISMA-ScR) flow diagram [35] (Figure 1).

2.6. Data Extraction and Synthesis

Extracted data were presented as a table (see Table 2), and were accompanied by a short narrative description that helped answer the research question in this sco** review. Results were synthesised in accordance with (a) objectives of this sco** review, and (b) approaches related to climate change, and (c) the way they encouraged young children to engage in climate action. Given that the aim of a sco** study is not to evaluate the quality of the evidence, but to summarise the evidence and make recommendations based on evidence, qualitative, quantitative, mixed methods, observational, and review studies, as well as dissertations, news articles, and opinion papers were included. Furthermore, consistent with JBI’s sco** review methodology adopted in the current study, assessments of quality and risk of bias of each study were not conducted. Scale elaborations and research protocols were excluded since they do not inform on the nature of the evidence required here. Rather, insights from each study were woven into a narrative synthesis of the findings, using textual descriptions of the articles [40].

3. Results

The systematic search identified studies reporting on approaches to engage young children with climate change. Upon screening the full texts, four peer-reviewed journal articles [26,41,42,43] and one conference paper [44] met the inclusion criteria and were included in the narrative synthesis below. A backward selection found one book chapter [45], a report [46] and a book [47] that met the inclusion criteria (see Table 2). Table 2 presents an overview of descriptive information for the studies.

Table 2. Summary of studies.

Authors	Year	Research Question(s) /Purpose	Population	Research Type	Country	Approaches to Foster Children’s Engagement
Ranta [41]	2023	How can implementing a rights-based research methodology contribute to the theory and practice of climate change research and education with young children?	Children—under age 8	Methodological paper—Journal Article	Ireland	Participatory approaches that include resources, such as rights, time, flexibility in research agenda, agency, a listening adult and a pedagogy that reinforces children’s authentic participation, allow the greater participation of children in CCE and related research.
Kadir & Islam [45]	2017	What are the social dynamics of adaptive capacity and how society perceives and responds to climate change? How is society’s response, and consequently their resilience, mediated through culture?	Young children—age not specified	Book Chapter	Bangladesh	Place and identity, social and culture capital, as well as the children’s social–ecological systems influence their ability to adapt to climatic changes and become resilient agents of change. A child-centred approach to teaching children about climate change is recommended.
Schill, Muratore, & Hogg [42]	2022	How do children manifest their engagement with environmental issues? What factors might foster or constrain children’s engagement with environmental issues?	Children—aged between 7 and 12 years	Research paper—Journal article	France	The use of child-centred, participatory approaches, such as drawings and interviews, to encourage children’s engagement in environmental issues at the individual (knowledge, personal interests, perceived responsibility and behaviour control) and collective levels (family communication style, socialisation processes).
Elkin Postila [43]	2022	To rethink environmental education in preschool by taking Donna Haraway’s (2016) call of staying with the trouble seriously by engaging with preschool children in investigations of dirty water and water purification.	Preschool children—age not specified	Research paper—Journal article	Sweden	Children’s engagement with environmental learning is encouraged via stories produced by the children and these were connected to stories from science, technology and fiction. The children and adults told and listened to stories about solar energy, water filtration machines and water robots, and water testing, using children’s diaries, texts, photographs, drawings and films and were weaved together into picture presentations of children’s voices.
Culén, Eilertsen, Lægreid, Pandey, Søyland, & Smørgrav Viddal [44]	2016	How can active conversations around environmental and climate issues be enhanced using the experience of the Eco-A (Culture and civic life)?	Three groups of children: up to ages 7, 8–10, and 11–13.	Conference paper	Norway	A course to engage children and young people with climate activism using urban culture and play to retrieve their memories about videos they watched together, and children are invited to reflect on their practices and those of family members, take action and speak up when given the opportunity to do so.
Bernard van Leer Foundation [46]	2021	Describes how countries and communities can increase children’s connectedness to nature, education and activism	Infants, children, youth, and parents/caregivers	Report	International	Describes the impacts of climate change starting in utero. Provides evidence of pedagogical approaches that encourage children’s climate action, such as learning through outdoor play, teaching children ethics of care, creating climate neutral schoolyards, and using photo essays.
Warden [47]	2022	How to use nature to teach about topics related to climate change and sustainability	Early childhood and primary school children	Book	UK	Proposes several approaches to a nature-based pedagogy and outdoor learning approaches aimed at hel** children learn about climate change and sustainability, while hel** them develop connectedness with nature, agency and climate activism.
Rooney [26]	2019	Explores the potential in children’s weathering encounters, as observed during an ethnographic research project titled Walking with Wildlife in Wild Weather Times.	Preschool children and their educators	Research paper—Journal article	Australia	Weather and Time—Children learning with the weather during daily walks in the countryside. The diverse ways children engage with the weather and the children’s interconnections with the weather, intersecting environmental education in the early years, children’s geographies and childhood studies.

Table 2. Summary of studies.

Authors	Year	Research Question(s) /Purpose	Population	Research Type	Country	Approaches to Foster Children’s Engagement
Ranta [41]	2023	How can implementing a rights-based research methodology contribute to the theory and practice of climate change research and education with young children?	Children—under age 8	Methodological paper—Journal Article	Ireland	Participatory approaches that include resources, such as rights, time, flexibility in research agenda, agency, a listening adult and a pedagogy that reinforces children’s authentic participation, allow the greater participation of children in CCE and related research.
Kadir & Islam [45]	2017	What are the social dynamics of adaptive capacity and how society perceives and responds to climate change? How is society’s response, and consequently their resilience, mediated through culture?	Young children—age not specified	Book Chapter	Bangladesh	Place and identity, social and culture capital, as well as the children’s social–ecological systems influence their ability to adapt to climatic changes and become resilient agents of change. A child-centred approach to teaching children about climate change is recommended.
Schill, Muratore, & Hogg [42]	2022	How do children manifest their engagement with environmental issues? What factors might foster or constrain children’s engagement with environmental issues?	Children—aged between 7 and 12 years	Research paper—Journal article	France	The use of child-centred, participatory approaches, such as drawings and interviews, to encourage children’s engagement in environmental issues at the individual (knowledge, personal interests, perceived responsibility and behaviour control) and collective levels (family communication style, socialisation processes).
Elkin Postila [43]	2022	To rethink environmental education in preschool by taking Donna Haraway’s (2016) call of staying with the trouble seriously by engaging with preschool children in investigations of dirty water and water purification.	Preschool children—age not specified	Research paper—Journal article	Sweden	Children’s engagement with environmental learning is encouraged via stories produced by the children and these were connected to stories from science, technology and fiction. The children and adults told and listened to stories about solar energy, water filtration machines and water robots, and water testing, using children’s diaries, texts, photographs, drawings and films and were weaved together into picture presentations of children’s voices.
Culén, Eilertsen, Lægreid, Pandey, Søyland, & Smørgrav Viddal [44]	2016	How can active conversations around environmental and climate issues be enhanced using the experience of the Eco-A (Culture and civic life)?	Three groups of children: up to ages 7, 8–10, and 11–13.	Conference paper	Norway	A course to engage children and young people with climate activism using urban culture and play to retrieve their memories about videos they watched together, and children are invited to reflect on their practices and those of family members, take action and speak up when given the opportunity to do so.
Bernard van Leer Foundation [46]	2021	Describes how countries and communities can increase children’s connectedness to nature, education and activism	Infants, children, youth, and parents/caregivers	Report	International	Describes the impacts of climate change starting in utero. Provides evidence of pedagogical approaches that encourage children’s climate action, such as learning through outdoor play, teaching children ethics of care, creating climate neutral schoolyards, and using photo essays.
Warden [47]	2022	How to use nature to teach about topics related to climate change and sustainability	Early childhood and primary school children	Book	UK	Proposes several approaches to a nature-based pedagogy and outdoor learning approaches aimed at hel** children learn about climate change and sustainability, while hel** them develop connectedness with nature, agency and climate activism.
Rooney [26]	2019	Explores the potential in children’s weathering encounters, as observed during an ethnographic research project titled Walking with Wildlife in Wild Weather Times.	Preschool children and their educators	Research paper—Journal article	Australia	Weather and Time—Children learning with the weather during daily walks in the countryside. The diverse ways children engage with the weather and the children’s interconnections with the weather, intersecting environmental education in the early years, children’s geographies and childhood studies.

Thoroughly covering those subjects is outside the scope of this review. Even though the current study did not attempt to provide a full review of the available literature, the literature most relevant to the issue under study is cited in each section below. Although great efforts were made to create a comprehensive search, it is highly likely that potentially valuable published research might have been missed.

All papers from peer reviewed journals that described the methods used to teach about issues of climate change to young children and which met the criteria for inclusion in this study are discussed below. Additionally, given the fact that the field of climate education in early childhood is still emerging and studies are limited, other studies that might provide additional insights into children’s engagement with climate action have been included.

Summary of Empirical Findings

Overall, studies presented in this review suggest that there are ways of engaging young children with climate action. Ranta [41] argues that a rights-based approach to CCE and research with young children, and a connection with nature, are important. Ranta [41] argues that given the necessary resources (rights, time, flexibility in research agenda, agency, a listening adult and a pedagogy that reinforces children’s authentic participation), young children are capable of participating in CCE and research.

Outdoor learning is a common pedagogy in many ECEC settings, particularly in the western world. This is influenced by the beliefs that first, a wide range of learning can happen in the outdoors, and second, connectedness with nature is an important way of teaching children how to develop a relationship with nature. Warden [47] reports on the importance of taking young children outside in the natural world to help them develop awareness of the environment. She advocates for a nature pedagogy—a pedagogical approach aimed at teaching children how to respect and support nature while recognising children’s rights—across the curriculum. Nature pedagogy uses both indoor and outdoor contexts to teach young children about nature and climate change, while enhancing children’s agency to empower them to take climate action.

The influence of culture on individual and collective environmental action is an important issue in childhood. With a focus on collective community action, Kadir and Islam [45] explored the adaptive capacity and potential for resilience as presented by culture, social dynamics and social capital. The authors suggest that place, identity and culture are intertwined, the interactions with the children’s social–ecological system influence their ability to adapt to climatic changes and become resilient agents of change, able to cope with change and crises. One of the most effective means of reducing children’s vulnerability to climate change is by adopting a child-centred approach to teaching children about climate change [41,45]. Recognising children’s voices and agency in the climate debate, place-based education fosters children’s connection to place and their sense of identity and belonging, therefore, creating vibrant partnerships between children and nature. Place-based education boosts children’s development and achievement, and improves environmental, social and economic vitality. Similarly, Culén, Eilertsen, Lægreid, Pandey, Søyland, and Smørgrav Viddal [44] used urban culture as a way to engage children in climate and environmental activism, in Norway, and to give them a voice in matters and debates around caring for the environment that are important to children, suggesting that playful interactions with children about climate issues helped them remember what they saw in videos and that children were able to reflect on their practices and those of family members, and take action and speak up when given the opportunity to do so.

Children’s sense of agency and their socialisation processes towards the environment within the family context were also important in sustaining their engagement with environmental issues. Schill, Muratore, and Hogg [42] explored whether and how French children engaged with environmental issues from a child-centred perspective, suggesting the importance of supporting and encouraging children’s engagement in environmental issues at the individual and collective levels. Schill et al. [42] reported that children’s engagement with environmental issues was influenced by individual factors, such as knowledge, interest, perceived responsibility and behavioural control, as well as socio-contextual factors, such as communication within the family and socialisation processes. Therefore, Schill et al. concluded that the adults’ agency is essential to empower children to take environmental action beyond their immediate ecosystems, but they were unable to determine the role of institutional contexts to influence children’s engagement with environmental issues [42].

Stories are an enjoyable and creative way of conveying complex messages to children in age-appropriate ways. Elkin Postila [43] used water as a way to investigate young children’s engagement with environmental learning in two preschools in Sweden. The author used stories produced by the children in the project and connected them to stories from science, technology and fiction. Together, the children and the researcher told and listened to stories about water as a practice of caring and thinking. Three stories (about solar energy, water filtration machines and water robots, and water testing) were produced using children’s diaries, texts, photographs, drawings and films and were weaved together into picture-presentations to create fiction as a way of listening to children’s voices about issues that mattered to them, thus recognising their agency in environmental issues. Using stories as a way of creating togetherness, the author managed to engage young children in the debate on climate change and other environmental concerns.

One international study looked at the importance of the early years for climate action. In their report, The Bernard van Leer Foundation [46] described the many ways countries and communities around the world are providing children diverse opportunities to deepen their love of nature, thus enhancing their connectedness with nature, a central goal of CCE for young children. The report cites several examples of how different countries such as India, Ethiopia, Brazil, and Peru, to mention but a few, are hel** children, children with disabilities, families and elders to create new ways of addressing climate issues and help children build resilience to deal with the uncertainties and challenges brought about by climate change in their communities.

The weather is part of young children’s lived experiences, and it is commonly used in early childhood settings as a pedagogical tool [48]. Set in the Australian context, Rooney [26] explored the concept of teaching children with the weather. Specifically, Rooney explored how weather changes can teach young children about the intensifying challenges of anthropogenic climate change. During daily walks undertaken in all weather conditions, children and their educators paid attention to the weather changes and the children’s encounters and relations with animals, plants and other elements found in nature. The weather embodies the localised elemental conditions of a place and time, and climate refers to the patterns and change in the atmosphere, over time [26]. Conversations between children and adults can help children to become aware of the different timescales and temporal effects of weather changes and how these could be the result of either natural or anthropogenic causes.

4. Discussion

The overarching aim of this review was to identify ways of fostering climate action amongst young children, in the context of ECEC. This review confirms that while there is a myriad of resources for teaching and learning about climate change [22], most of the work contributing to the topic under investigation (approaches aimed at fostering climate action in the early years) is either theoretical or qualitative in nature. This review also indicates that a wide range of research gaps exist. Such findings are to be expected given that the field of inquiry is still emerging.

Research suggests that higher levels of education about climate change usually translate into higher adaptive capacity and resilience to climate change, and highly educated individuals suffer fewer consequences as a result of the damages brought about by climate change [49]. Yet, since investment in education and human capital is likely to be affected by climate change too, education will need to adjust to the realities of climate change, a hard challenge that remains open to questions and interpretations [17,21], even in ECEC.

Climate change is a complex scientific concept. In the face of increasing fragility, societal transformation towards a more critical perspective of how we deal with the challenge is required. In this context, theoretical and practical approaches can help generate new insights and perspectives to address the climate challenge that we face today. In early childhood research, there is a strong empirical understanding of the science experiences of young children, but there is very limited understanding about how learning about climate change happens and how such learning could lead to climate action in early childhood. Most early childhood research has explored the processes of scientific concept formation during a teaching intervention or an activity conducted in the school yard [50]. In fact, there is a tendency to conduct research examining the processes of concept formation about climate change, and empirical research focussing on an understanding of how such concepts can be translated into action is still required. Research exploring what kinds of pedagogical approaches can amplify children’s understanding of climate change and how young children can be encouraged to take individual and climate action is still scant. Such research could offer insight into how learning about climate change happens as children develop, under what conditions, what kind of approaches are needed to study this age group, and how teachers can plan for early childhood development of the scientific concept formation of climate change, and to point new directions in climate change research in ECEC. Here, parallels between empirical research exploring how young children develop a variety of scientific concepts ranging from astronomy [51], sound [52,53], and light [54], to heat transfer [55] can be used to transfer the findings to the current inquiry. Some of these studies [51,52,53,54,55] have also explored educational frameworks that promote scientific literacy in young children and some have examined the critical role of the teacher, the importance of child–teacher interactions and communication during science learning [56,57], and the importance of parental involvement in science learning in the early years [58]. Together, these studies indicate that multiple and complex understandings of scientific and technical concepts are formed early in life via children’s everyday experiences and interactions with others around them.

This review shows that in the early years, many education programmes typically focus on learning in and about nature, adopting a nature-based approach [26,48]. Nature-based solutions are defined as “actions to protect, conserve, restore, sustainably use and manage natural or modified terrestrial, freshwater, coastal and marine ecosystems, which address social, economic and environmental challenges effectively and adaptively, while simultaneously providing human well-being, ecosystem services and resilience and biodiversity benefits” (UNEA/EA.5/Res.5) [59]. Such approaches tend to focus on the causes of climate change and the science behind it in a way that is age-appropriate but still, very few approaches address issues of mitigation and adaptation, the use of technology or the implementation of actions and solutions. While a nature-based pedagogy recognises the importance of discovery and experiential learning in ECEC, such pedagogy does not necessarily address the ongoing issue related to the scientific and political decision-making processes involved in the climate crisis. This is partly because many nature-based pedagogical approaches often aim to increase children’s knowledge of environmental issues, such as climate change, without meeting the children’s emotional needs. Considering care as a critical concept to teaching and learning in the early years, nature-based pedagogical approaches could have strong transformational effects by hel** children develop an emotional connection with nature and environmental stewardship in early childhood. Conradi (p. 117) defines care as “as a form of practice that is constituted and shaped by its participants”, implying an interdependence of communicative contact, practice and interactivity present in human relationships [60]. Understood this way, care is located within the individual and within a community, where human beings care for each other and for nature within and for a community.

Many of the resources available to early childhood educators are aimed at teaching children about an environmental issue, such as climate change, or an element in nature. This means that most available resources are aimed at teaching children about, rather than with nature. Rooney [26] provides an example of children learning with the weather. Slowing down to listen to children and adopting a less linear and open approach to unexpected learning, also known as ‘slow pedagogy’, is another good example of encouraging young children to engage with climate action [26]. This could be achieved during daily walks, where children are offered time and space to actively engage in learning together with nature, rather than about nature and climate change. Multi-sensory activities are also good examples, where children learn to critically observe and interact with natural elements, and take time to slow down (e.g., walking slowly and noticing what happens around them) to learn to pay attention and understand how through their interactions, people and nature can shape one another over time and space [26]. By allowing children to slow down and take their time and space to learn and engage with the natural world around them, educators can learn a lot. As educators observe how young children attend to the world around them, they can draw on possibilities and ways to encourage children to explore new connections with nature and encourage them to reflect upon these experiences. In this way, educators help children to understand how natural elements and human encounters with the world have always shaped each other in interactive and temporal ways, over time and in different situations [26,48]. Simply put, attending to the little moments in everyday life could be an alternative way of responding the climate change in the early years [48].

Framing ECEC within this context calls for a dynamic approach to CCE in ECEC. In doing so, this review repositions the relationship between theory and practice, and climate change and society as being more interactive compared to a unidirectional approach of theory that often informs practice [60]. Here, emphasis is placed on engaging in critical approach that enables ‘doing transformations’ [60] by different actors (children and adults) in different contexts so as to identify socially and culturally significant entry points, skills, challenges, and barriers to deep transformational change that is required to address the current climate crisis, so that change happens in varying timescales, and across systems and cultures. Indeed, the studies presented in this review provide a preliminary understanding of the ways of fostering climate action in ECEC across cultures. From an anthropological standpoint, how climate change is experienced and perceived is largely influenced by one’s personal experiences and identity, within a particular context, over time. Culture is a major anthropological contributor to our understanding and perceptions of climate change. From a Vygotskian perspective, culture offers children the social capital and cultural tools (beliefs, rituals, artefacts and stories) to enhance their ability to interact with peers, in a community [61]. Culture and a sense of place, or place attachment, shape individual and collective experiences and meanings of climate change. Protective adaptation from an individual and collective standpoint, depends on how the groups of children, who share the same values and beliefs, perceive their risks of climate change as well as their ability to adapt to the uncertainty brought about by the climate crisis. The studies presented in this review suggest that at this age and despite cultural differences, young children are capable of engaging in climate action if they are provided with opportunities that acknowledge their voices and agency. A sense of collectively sharing the same experience through play helps young children to develop a shared imagination, where together with adults (teachers and parents/caregivers), they may be able to communicate and amplify learning about climate change and consequently feel empowered to take climate action.

4.1. Gaps in the Literature

This review aimed to map the gaps in this emerging field of inquiry and make recommendations for areas of future research to address this problem. Drawing on the findings of this review, we have preliminary understanding of what to focus on in order to help children build a bond with and love for nature, along with individual and collective climate action, which in turn, enables them to engage in systems level change later on in life. While this process has provided some answers, it raised more questions by identifying the many gaps in the literature, highlighting where more work is needed to help move the field forward and to help us understand how to better support children’s experiences of climate activism in the early years. Indeed, there are many areas in which concrete recommendations can be made, with some being more relevant to specific contexts than others. It should also be acknowledged that there are clear gaps in this review that may limit the ability to provide comprehensive recommendations across all areas. Therefore, it is worth noting that the recommendations presented here specifically look at young children and their needs.

What research there has been has taken a siloed approach to CCE in ECEC, focussing mostly on develo** children’s biophilia (a positive relationship with nature and the more-than-human world). While knowledge-based approaches in their early years can be beneficial for teaching certain concepts in the early years, in the face of increasing fragility brought about by the climate crisis, a radical connection between the CCE and ECEC is required.

Certainly, it is important to amplify children’s voices, individually and collectively, for climate action. The need for the development of a child-centred CCE that is based on the children’s voices is still lacking. Next, research into engaging the voices of young vulnerable children, such as children with disabilities or children from low-socioeconomic backgrounds, will greatly improve the ability to plan approaches to climate action in effective and impactful ways.

Action-oriented pedagogies of care, hope and action, such as storytelling and citizenship education can help support children’s learning to enable them to take personal and collective climate action [43]. Play helps children grapple with what it means to be part of the world around them. Play is also an opportunity to encourage children to engage with climate activity, which is not to be missed [26]. Stories and play vary across communities, and therefore, more research in diverse countries around the world is warranted to help us understand how to help children to meaningfully engage in climate action across cultures and contexts through play. The use of digital technology in early years is increasing. Mobile apps can be used to help children interact with nature over time [26] and amplify their voices but such research warrants further investigation.

Future research could include parents and caregivers to create climate-resilient families able to provide guidance and support for responsive climate action. Certainly, there is a need for research that explores the roles of schools, families and communities in hel** young children engage in meaningful climate action and intervention studies in particular are needed. Specifically, there is a need for longitudinal studies to better understand how children can be supported throughout childhood to take climate action from a broad range of countries and communities, as there may be differential ways of active engagement with climate change in different social–ecological contexts. Research could include collective action within the community, where community-based and child-sensitive projects are implemented by adults and children to increase adaptation strategies.

Currently, we still lack cross-national, longitudinal experimental research projects that understand how climate change activism can be encouraged even in early childhood. For example, future research could include children as well as scientists, artists, activists and philosophers working together to take action for ecological change [48]. Therefore, there is an urgent need for research that moves away from the siloed approach to presenting information about climate change and access to resources and the capacity to use them effectively to foster children’s engagement with climate activism from an early age.

Most studies presented in this review emerged from richer countries in the Global North, with very few emerging from the Global South, even though the latter are often more adversely impacted by climate change. This scarcity of research could be due to the fact that this review only considered work published in English or it could be due to lack of funding opportunities to conduct such research in countries in the Global South. How culture and religious beliefs may impact the opportunities offered to young children to engage with climate action is largely unknown. Specifically, what is missing in the literature is an understanding of how concepts around climate action are formed and supported across different age groups and cultures, how teaching and learning of science in infancy happens, what it looks like in everyday educational practice, and how the process of science concept formation happens over time from infancy to early childhood, across cultures.

Together, the recommendations identified reflect the findings of the current review and it is hoped that leaders in the field will use these to help the field to continue to evolve. It is critical at this point that researchers, policymakers and teacher trainers take steps to enable climate education in the early years to become the powerful climate action tool that equips the younger generation with the knowledge, skills, behaviours, values and attitudes they need to face the climate challenge throughout their lifetime. Young children need to be taught about environmental challenges but they also need to be equipped with the tools they need to protect all living systems on the planet.

4.2. Limitations

There are several limitations to the present review that are worth considering. First, as the connection between young children and climate action is an emerging field of research, and the terminology within the area of inquiry is still develo**, this review may have missed some emerging studies. Secondly, with a small sample size, caution must be applied, as the findings might not be transferable to other contexts and cultures. A third limitation of this study is that even though this review considered all geographic regions, the search was limited to material published in English. While acknowledging the fact that there are countries with a rich base of research in the field of ESD and CCE, such studies were not written in English, and this made it practically impossible to survey all studies, in all languages. Given this limitation, this review attempted to incorporate the results of studies from as many different national contexts as possible rather than to focus solely on studies dealing with English-speaking, western countries. It is suggested that future research include research published in diverse languages.

Despite these limitations, this review has a number of strengths worth noting. First, the field of climate action in early childhood is an emerging field of research that is under-researched, under-theorised and under-resourced. To the author’s knowledge, this is the first review to specifically explore ways of fostering climate action amongst young children in the early years systematically. Next, this review is a step in the right direction towards answering some of the questions posed by Reid [17] about what CCE should look like and which approaches are sufficient to achieve the task. Additionally, this review utilised a systematic and broad search approach to identify and bring together multidisciplinary research to early childhood research.

5. Conclusions

The aim of this review was to identify and describe the existing literature highlighting the approaches used in ECEC to foster climate action amongst young children; map the gaps in this emerging field of inquiry; and make recommendations for areas of future research to address this problem.

The cognitive and social–emotional skills that children develop in the early years have long-lasting impacts on their outcomes later on in life, and these can be impacted by the climate crisis. Climate change and environmental degradation present significant challenges to humanity and are a threat to children’s developments and their rights [7,8,9]. To date, we do not fully understand the true impact of climate change on young children, and societal transformation towards a more critical perspective of how we deal with this challenge is required. In this context, theoretical and practical approaches can help generate new insights and perspectives to address the climate challenge that we face today.

Thanks to the SDGs, the emerging research in the field of early childhood research with particular focus on CCE, is increasing. Emerging evidence indicates that more countries are including climate change education in their national curricula. Although this is an important step, in most countries there is insufficient social and political will to provide teachers with the adequate training and policies to deal with the climate crisis in ECEC [22]. Yet, as we have seen in this review, there is still more to be done. Many resources are needed across the curricula and throughout communities. This is a pivotal moment for understanding the challenges/opportunities provided by ECEC in relation to climate action in different cultural and political contexts. To achieve the goals stipulated in the SDGs, a rethinking of future directions of ECEC and how it can be culturally meaningful and appropriate, ensuring it is affordable, inclusive and accessible, is required. Going forward, multidisciplinary collaborations and research funding are needed to design and implement creative, and culturally and age-appropriate approaches to effective climate action in ECEC.

In conclusion, we are still left with the question as to whether young children’s participation in climate action can help provide current and future generations with the knowledge, attitudes, and agency to help them adapt to and mitigate the effects of climate change.