13th International Congress on Mathematical Education Hamburg, 24-31 July 2016 1 - 1 CLIMATE CHANGE IN MATHEMATICS CLASSROOMS Lisa Steffensen, Ragnhild Hansen and Kjellrun Hiis Hauge Bergen University College An online survey was carried out to get a first impression of what teachers do in classrooms, and why, in relation to climate change and mathematics education. Barbosa’s perspectives of mathematical modelling inspired the questionnaire: “modelling as vehicle”, “modelling as content” and “modellings as critics”. The survey response was mainly qualitative in nature. Although the questionnaire did not address modelling specifically, several of the teacher’s answers to the open questions refer to modelling. In this paper, we analyze the answers in accordance to perspectives of mathematical modelling and to different modelling stages. The teachers express a great variety of ways to approach the topic, where many of these may be related to modelling. INTRODUCTION Climate change is a complex topic that involves expertise from a wide range of fields. The degree of mathematics applied in all aspects of the topic, indicates that a range of thematic areas could be relevant for mathematics classrooms. Climate change has received increased attention within mathematics education the last decade. It seems that critical, theoretical and normative perspectives dominate this part of the academic literature, and they are often accompanied by ideas linked to mathematical modelling. For example, Barwell and Suurtamm (2010) called for more visibility in the modelling of climate change, for instance through information on model assumptions. They further suggested that mathematics education has a responsibility in facilitating critical reflections on model assumptions and the role of mathematics in people’s understanding of climate change. Barwell (2013) later theorized these ideas based on normative philosophies associated with critical citizenship. Assumptions in mathematical models were also a topic in Hansen’s (2012) paper, where she reflected on an article in a local newspaper where future sea levels in her hometown were predicted as an effect of global warming. Her focus was on mathematical modelling as a classroom activity to prepare students for critical engagement. Hauge and Barwell (2015) examined how uncertainty is expressed in texts on global temperature change, which is also related to assumptions in mathematical modelling and critical citizenship. While the above references exemplify the normative and theoretical approaches in the academic literature, we find limited literature on what teachers actually do related to climate change in classrooms, and why. To achieve insight into this, we carried out a scoping survey through an online questionnaire. In this paper, we study what the responses can tell us about how teachers connect the topic of climate change to mathematical modelling.