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Educational Resources
Students around the world learn about the Ecological Footprint in elementary, secondary, and university classrooms.Footprint Calculator
Students can use our online Footprint Calculator to measure their personal Ecological Footprints, discover their biggest areas of resource consumption, and learn what they can do to tread more lightly on the Earth.Ecological Footprint Explorer
Ecological Footprint data for over 200 countries is freely available on our Ecological Footprint Explorer. Educators can use the open data platform in lesson plans on sustainability as well as statistics.Every semester I have my students calculate their Footprint, change their lifestyle for one week to decrease that Footprint, then compare the results and how it would impact the number of people that could sustainably exist on the planet. Students are shocked when they discover their results. The fact that it is personal and tells them how many planets we would need if everyone on the planet lived as they do drives home the issue better than I ever could in lecture.
Calculator Blog Posts
Guimarães, Portuguese municipalities launch their city Footprint Calculators
By Armando Alves Portugal’s Cities Footprint project, now in its second year, launched the first city Footprint Calculator in Guimarães today. Residents can use it to assess their household’s use... More ›
Join us at two California Universities for Turning Green's College Road Tour
We are so excited to join Turning Green’s College Road Tour at two universities in California! Don’t miss this tabling exhibition that features sustainable lifestyle themes (Footprint, food, fashion, body,... More ›Ecotourism Course
The MEET Network, with support from Global Footprint Network, developed a free online course which explores the development of ecotourism products for Mediterranean Protected Areas. Students are introduced to the concept of the Ecological Footprint and explore how it can be used to support ecotourism development and monitoring.
Footprint Futures Module
Footprint Futures is a university-level teaching module for exploring the sustainability challenge facing human economies. The module consists of a student-driven exploration into what the optimal scale of material demand is for a national economy, using real country examples. More specifically, it asks: What would be a given country’s optimal Footprint compared to the country’s biocapacity by 2050?
Understanding Sustainable Living
The World’s Largest Lesson is a collection of lesson plans and other teaching resources related to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals approved by world leaders in 2015 to to end extreme poverty, fight inequality and injustice, and stem climate change. The Understanding Sustainable Living lesson was developed for ages 11-14 to address goal #12, Responsible Consumption and Production. The lesson plan features the Footprint calculator and profiles of four children around the world for class discussion.
Activities
Hands-on activities and videos to learn about the Ecological Footprint, climate change, and what we can do to create a sustainable planet.
The Fish Game
You have 10 days to catch as many fish as you can. The money you make from these fish will need to support your family for the next month. Each fish nets $2. The Fish Game, created by the Cloud Institute for Sustainability Education, helps kids and adults better understand resource constraints and sustainability. Play the game online and find out how to make the most out of your resources!
More Fun Activities
Footprint Drawing: Suggest ways to reduce your Ecological Footprint in a drawing like the one by a seventh grader at left.
Recycling Game: Play a game and learn the basics of recycling.
Trashy Stationery: Don’t trash your trash, when you can recycle it into beautiful cards and stationery!
Videos
Watch videos about the Ecological Footprint, climate change, natural resources, and more. Our curated collection features a TEDx talk, Bill Nye, Concerned Kittens, and National Geographic Kids.
Population Conversation
Population is a particularly challenging and sensitive topic, yet its impact is underestimated. If presented well, discussing the population factor can be an empowering and engaging learning opportunity. We created materials for engaging classroom discussions, starting with voices from around the world addressing the question “should we even discuss population?” The voices are complemented with an in-depth essay, which strengthens teachers’ background on the topic and includes a list of questions to stimulate classroom conversations. For the more mathematically inclined, we produced a downloadable population cohort calculator sheet to project population change.
Additional Resources
The Ecological Footprint: Managing our Biocapacity Budget book is available to order in the US here and for other countries here.
Teaching with Ecological Footprints curriculum from Vanderbilt University Center for Teaching.
Kid-friendly article on the Ecological Footprint, with link to Footprint calculator for children, from KQED Quest.
Learn the Climate Change Basics from the Environmental Protection Agency.
Engage students in learning conservation techniques at home and at school with a lesson plan from the National Wildlife Federation for grades 4-6.
Find out what’s causing sea-level rise in a classroom activity from NASA for grades 2-8.
Graph global temperature trends with NASA’s Classroom Activity for grades 5-12.
Manage your energy budget with a lesson from PBS LearningMedia for grades 6-12.
A hands-on, inquiry-based, curriculum for year 9 or year 10 students on global warming and renewable energy from the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering.
Terracycle curriculum lesson sets from The Cloud Institute for Sustainability Education.
Resources from Germany
German website on nature and the environment for children from Bundesministerium für Umwelt, Naturschutz, Bau und Reaktorsicherheit (BMUB).
Weekly teaching lessons on timely environmental topics from BMUB.
Dowloadable classroom materials on environmental topics, including biodiversity, renewable energy and climate change, from BMUB.