We use different energy sources in our daily life for various purposes such as domestic, transportation and industrial usage. Those energy sources take many forms, including fossil energy like oil, coal, and natural gas; renewable sources like wind, solar, geothermal and hydropower; and nuclear energy. However, are these energy sources the most suitable and reliable for our planet? What is affordable and clean energy?
Globally, around 2.4 billion people still use inefficient, traditional fuels, including wood, charcoal, and animal waste in 2020. These traditional fuels produce air-polluting emissions that cause respiratory illnesses and other health problems. Additionally, they are inefficient because a remarkable amount of energy is consumed to maintain a working heating, cooking or commuting system with these fuels. Finally, fossil energy and traditional fuels are non-sustainable energy types. If we do not create alternative energy sources, there will be no energy in future when we run out of fossil energy.
As opposed to these, clean energy can be described best as the energy gained from renewable sources that do not release air pollutants. So, it doesn’t negatively impact the environment, such as carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide. Clean energy is mainly derived from wind power, solar energy, hydropower, and geothermal energy. Therefore, clean energy resources are constantly replenished.
That is the number one reason the United Nations aims to ensure affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy systems around the globe through the Sustainable Development Goals. Named SDG 7, this goal works to increase energy efficiency and replace polluting fuels with electricity and clean, renewable resources, such as natural gas, biogas, solar power, and hydropower. Efficient energy systems reduce energy consumption, costs, energy dependency on nonrenewable resources, and, most importantly, environmental pollution.
Within the last decade, there has been a significant increase in people with access to electricity and clean energy systems. For example, in 2008, only 55% of people had access to clean fuels for cooking, while the percentage went up to 63% in 2018. Similarly, 82% of the world’s population had access to electricity in 2008; it also increased to 90% in 2018. We, as a civilisation, also made impressive progress in electrification and reducing energy consumption in recent years. The amount of renewable energy consumed increased by a quarter between 2010 and 2019; still, renewables accounted for only 17.7% of total energy consumption.
To support renewable energy systems for a better future. Technology in education can make all these much more accessible as many excellent sources exist online. So, yes, embracing EdTech can transform teaching, but it can also transform the next generation’s lifestyle into a sustainable and renewable life.
Importance & Benefits of Affordable and Clean Energy
Affordable and clean energy has many significant economic, geographical, and environmental benefits. However, environmental benefits may be the most important of all because clean energy reduces harmful gas emissions, preserves natural resources, and prevents the potential ecological and climate crises related to energy supply and use.
Economical Benefits
The renewable and clean energy industry creates more job opportunities as it is more labour intensive in contrast to the fossil energy industry. That way, a greater number of people can be employed, which increases gross national income. Additionally, renewable and clean energy systems reduce costs as they do not require transportation and do not need to pay for raw materials. The decline in energy costs, when combined with the decrease in consumption, makes clean and renewable energy much more affordable to the lower-income members of society.
Preserving Natural Resources
The experts argue that the resources for fossil fuels will become extinct in the future as there will be no renewal for them. So, it’s crucial to adopt clean and sustainable energy systems in modern societies. Sustainable and clean energy is derived from renewable sources like wind, water, and solar power. So, it provides reliable power supplies and preserves the national natural resources.
Decreases Risks of Environmental Crises
With energy gained from fossil fuels, there is the problem of importation. It requires a complex transportation system for such an amount of energy. So, importing fuels enhances the risk of fuel spills which can cause contamination of water and land; fossil fuels emit toxic gases and air pollutants.
Clean and Renewable Energy Technologies
Solar Panels
Solar power is one of the most plentiful energy sources available as many places have lots of sunlight during the day all year. It has become the 3rd largest renewable energy contributor with a growth in the use of solar panels both for domestic and industrial purposes in recent years. The energy gained from solar panels accounts for 3.1% of global energy generation.
Wind Turbines
This kind of sustainable energy resource alone has the potential to create considerably more electricity than the current global demand. We can use wind power to generate electricity both on and offshore in windy areas. In 2020, offshore wind electricity generation increased by 29% and onshore by 11%. However, we still cannot create more energy than the global demand as that would require more investments in wind turbines.
Hydroelectric Power Plants
Hydroelectric power plants use the force of running water near powerful river currents and streams to generate electricity. Hydropower generates approximately 60% of the total renewable energy. We avoided over 100 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions over the last 50 years thanks to the clean energy derived from hydropower.
Bioenergy
Bioenergy is a source that uses biomass and organic materials to create electricity. Still, this energy source requires burning those materials, but it does not have as much negative impact as burning fossil fuels. Biomass is the general term for agricultural, industrial, domestic and animal waste in solid, liquid and gas forms. Bioenergy technologies have both economic and environmental benefits as they recycle and reuse a particular amount of waste.
How to Raise Awareness on Clean Energy for Kids?
Be A Role Model: Even before they reach the age to understand everything told to them, children can pick up habits or awareness on specific subjects. For example, if you actively prevent wasting energy at home, such as turning off unnecessary lights and the faucet, opening the windows rather than using air conditioner on hot days, etc., your child would perform those themselves.
Have Conversation With Your Kids: Children can learn so many things, even during a casual talk with their parents, instructors, or caretakers. You can break the topic down casually and explain affordable and clean energy definitions, give examples of renewable sources, and discuss why we need them.
Employ Online and Visual Resources: We can say that the place of technology in education expands with each new day. Sometimes visual and interactive resources can make what an hour-long speech can’t do. You can easily keep children’s attention with videos, presentations, games, or animations. For example, you can find many educational videos and games about sustainable energy resources and how we can produce electricity from natural resources.
Do DIY Projects About The Topic: There are many ways to teach children something, and one of the best ways is to make them experience it. For example, you can build mini water wheels using popsicle sticks or wind turbines with used plastic bottles to show how we can turn natural forces into energy sources.
We believe that the importance of STEM education is outstanding in a child’s educational development. Yet, we also believe that our purpose as a society should be bringing up future leaders who respect the Earth and adopt sustainability as a lifestyle. That’s why we support double-winged learning with all our hearts.
The UN’s Sustainable Development Goals are a universal call to action. They were established in response to the shortcomings of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). While the MDGs succeeded in raising awareness about global development problems, they were not sufficiently broad or holistic. The SDGs build on and extend from the MDGs by addressing their limitations and providing a more universal scope for actionable goals we can achieve over the next 15 years.
Why teaching Sustainable Development Goals is essential?
Teaching Sustainable Development Goals encompasses all STEM subjects and reaches beyond the topics in the classroom. It gives children future skills and real-world understanding that they can use for the betterment of the planet. It provides today’s children with the skills they need for future challenges such as climate change, health crises or social issues. It offers them a deeply engraved understanding of why the environment and society are essential. Teaching Sustainable Development Goals not only enables children to nurture skills but it also motivates them and gives them the values to take action. The see and understand that their own well-being is connected with the well-being of their community and the planet.
How Twin is integrating Sustainable Development Goals?
Twin cultivates a generation of competent & socially responsible changemakers using a double-winged education method. Double-winged education includes a purpose-led curriculum with STEM-based learning phases. The curriculum introduces students to sustainability solutions to complex problems. Students discover 300+ science experiments and create hands-on projects. They also get inspired by friends & peers by seeing their projects on the social platform Twin app. The app provides a playful learning experience for children. They can learn complex topics related to Sustainable Development Goals while having fun. Parents and teachers can learn about children’s unique skills and interests with the Twin App’s AI-based monthly skills report.
How is Sustainable Development Goals integrated into the content?
Here is an example 4-week journey from the Twin app:
Download Twin app and teach Sustainable Development Goals to your children!
Some Example SDG’s:
Goal 1: End poverty in all its forms everywhere
Poverty rates have halved since 1990, but there is still much work to be done to end it. The goal of poverty reduction is to increase the overall standard of living in developing countries by reducing the number of people living on less than $1.25/day. It also works to reduce inequalities in income and wealth between developed and developing countries.The goal of ending poverty will be accomplished by promoting inclusive economic growth, reducing inequality, and investing in social services like healthcare and education.
Goal 2: End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture
Hunger and malnutrition are direct consequences of poverty, and maintaining a healthy diet and lifestyle is often the first thing to go after financial difficulties arise. The goal of ending hunger seeks to ensure that all people have access to food that is nutritious and safe to eat. It also aims to raise the overall standard of living by improving agricultural techniques that promote sustainability.The goal of ending hunger will be accomplished by investing in sustainable agriculture, reducing food waste, and providing better access to food for lower-income populations.
Goal 3: Ensure healthy lives and wellbeing for all
The goal of improving global health is to increase the overall quality of life by reducing infant mortality, disease and disability, and increasing life expectancy. This goal also works to reduce gaps in health outcomes between developed and underdeveloped areas.The goal of ensuring healthy lives will be accomplished by investing in better access to healthcare, increasing vaccinations, and reducing the rates of smoking and drinking.
Goal 4: Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all
The goal of increasing global education rates is to ensure that all people have access to proper educational resources. This goal works to reduce the existing gap in educational outcomes between developed and developing areas.The goal of ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education will be accomplished by increasing government spending on education, promoting better teacher training, and reducing the cost of education.
Goal 5: Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls
The goal of promoting gender equality works to reduce the gap between men and women in terms of healthcare, education, economic participation, and political leadership.The goal of achieving gender equality and empowering all women and girls will be accomplished by reducing discrimination, increasing female literacy, and promoting participation in political and economic activities.
Goal 6: Ensure availability of clean water and sanitation for all
The goal of reducing the number of people without access to clean water and sanitation works to increase the overall health of communities through better hygiene.The goal of ensuring clean water and sanitation will be accomplished by investing in better water systems, establishing sanitation programs, and reducing the amount of water and waste lost through leaks.
Goal 7: Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of ecosystems
The goal of promoting sustainable agriculture and forestry practices works to preserve the health of ecosystems and reduce pollution.The goal of protecting, restoring, and promoting sustainable use of ecosystems will be accomplished by increasing forest coverage, managing fisheries to reduce overfishing, and reducing the amount of greenhouse gases produced by agriculture.
Goal 8: Promote sustainable economic growth and job creation
The goal of promoting sustainable economic growth works to reduce extreme poverty and improve the overall standard of living among lower-income populations.The goal of promoting sustainable economic growth will be accomplished by increasing investment in research and development, reducing inequalities in income, and promoting more equitable distribution of wealth.
Goal 9: Develop a global partnership for development
The goal of building a sustainable global partnership works to encourage international collaboration to solve global issues.The goal of developing a global partnership for development will be accomplished by encouraging international collaboration, increasing funding for development assistance, and reducing the risk of global conflicts.
Sustainable Development Goals for Kids: A Simple Guide for Parents
The Sustainable Development Goals are a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure prosperity for all. These 17 goals recognize that solving one problem often has the unfortunate consequence of creating another.The Sustainable Development Goals were established in response to the shortcomings of the Millennium Development Goals. While the MDGs succeeded in raising awareness about global development problems, they were not sufficiently broad or holistic. The SDGs build on and extend from the MDGs by addressing their limitations and providing a more universal scope for actionable goals we can achieve over the next 15 years.These goals represent a significant change in the way the international community approaches global poverty reduction. They represent a shift from a disease- or problem-based approach to a systems-based one. If a system is functioning properly, it can self-correct to account for new variables. A systems-based approach to development goals allows us to focus on root causes rather than symptoms alone.
In 2015, the United Nations adopted 17 global goals, officially named the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), with a universal call to action to end poverty, establish equality and provide an effective health system all around the globe by 2030. These SDGs are integrated with each other because the United Nations understand that we can only achieve development when social, economic and environmental sustainability is balanced.
Providing good health and well-being for all ages is critical to sustainable development. Currently, the world is facing a global health crisis that harms the global economy and damages billions of people’s physical and mental health worldwide. The pandemic highlighted the critical role of healthcare workers, the necessity of being prepared and the importance of technology investments in healthcare. As a result of better funding, improved hygiene, and access to medical services, the UN made significant progress in reducing several leading causes of death and disease associated with child and maternal mortality, increasing life expectancy and halving HIV and malaria deaths.
Covid-19 has claimed 15 million lives, including 115,500 front-line healthcare workers. Heavy workload and financial aspects of covid treatments have disrupted essential health services in 92% of countries. As a result, global life expectancy and immunisation have regressed while anxiety and depression disorders and deaths from tuberculosis and malaria have increased.
These kinds of effects of Covid-19 show us how critical health systems for sustainable development are. They also proved the benefits of technology to children and adults once again. We, as global citizens, understand that we must ensure efficient health systems by using science and technologies.
Importance of Ensuring Healthy Lives and Promoting Well-being for All at All Ages
Promoting good health and wellbeing is crucial to establishing developed, prosperous and equal societies. People can thrive and be productive where they can get nourishment, access an efficient health system and feel safe. Before all, access to good health and well-being is a fundamental human right. That is why the Sustainable Development Agenda aims to provide all people worldwide access to the highest healthcare system standards.
Despite the significant progress in good health and well-being projects in recent years, great inequalities in health care access among developing nations, minorities and disadvantaged groups still exist. Every year, over 6 million children younger than five die, and half of the women in developing regions cannot access the necessary medical services.
American Public Media Research Lab states that Black Americans have mortality rates significantly higher than all other races and ethnic groups except Indigenous people. In 2020, life expectancy dropped most sharply for Latin and Black people. Millions of children in low-income countries die from preventable diseases like influenza, pneumonia, and others. Inaction abandons millions of people to their fate and causes economic problems in low-income countries, which leads to even greater poverty. Ensuring a good health system and well-being for those people will save millions of lives and eliminate the costs of preventable illnesses. An estimated $1 billion investment in immunisation against contagious diseases could save 1 million children’s lives annually. When those people are vaccinated, the cost of treatments that will reach $7 trillion in the next 15 years can also be used to improve health systems.
Using Technology to Advance Global Health
We incorporated technology into every aspect of our lives with mobile devices and the internet. Technology helps us develop many medical devices, explore better ways for treatments and give us more accurate results in patients’ medical examinations. However, technology also allows us to keep track of our health values and encourage us to be more active, drink more water, etc. There’s a saying, “Protecting something is much easier than fixing it.” We can apply this mindset to our health. Promoting good health and wellbeing is more practical, easier, and costs lower. Urging people to adopt more healthy habits and lifestyles reduces hospital patient load and medical expenses over time.
Some corporations developed smart activewear devices that monitor users’ medical values to reduce health and wellbeing problems. For example, Apple released a smartwatch that can keep track of the users’ detailed lifestyle activities, such as daily steps, exercise time, sleeping patterns, heart rate and blood oxygen levels. Users can also keep track of their menstrual cycle to see if there is any disruption or irregularity. Many apps also help users track blood pressure, blood glucose values, and calories taken and spent. Those apps provide their users’ statistics through mobile devices or websites. This way, patients or healthy users can overview their medical state. If allowed, apps can also send the users personalised messages or notifications about their medical values. Those notifications may remind users to drink water and exercise and alert them about high/low blood pressure or glucose.
This kind of apps urge users to adopt healthier and more active lifestyles. They also may greatly help children gain the must-have 21st-century skills as kids will learn how to plan, track data and draw conclusions about their physical state. In general, technology can promote good health and well-being along with supporting the patients’ medical treatments.
Online school, technology, family concept. Happy young parents helping to children to study at home
How to Raise Awareness on Good Health for Kids
The good health and well-being of children influence many other aspects of their lives, including fitness, health, academic success and self-confidence. Before all, it’s essential to encourage children to adopt healthy habits and eat well to lead healthy and active lives. Schools play a crucial role in educating children about the meaning of good health and well-being as well as in promoting healthy habits. Still, most of the responsibility falls upon the families. There are some things parents can do to promote good health and wellbeing:
Being a good role model
Encouraging daily physical activity for at least an hour
Serving child-size portions
Promoting healthy meals and snacks
Monitoring screen time and sleep quality
Additionally, we must understand that technology has merged into our everyday life in recent years and that embracing EdTech transformed teaching. This influence can be clearly seen in how online games and apps – like the NHS food scanner app – helps urge children to adopt healthier lifestyles and habits.
Twin App also aims to encourage kids’ physical activities while educating them about STEM. We shape our content around a double-winged curriculum so that children can learn how to apply the gained skills to the real world through hands-on activities. Through double-winged learning, we aspire to bring up inspirational young minds who can build a better future using science and technology.
The most thrilling part about being in education is to be able to envision the future. We get to ask ourselves big questions such as, “In twenty years, who do we want to see running our governments, institutions or simply our local store? What kind of questions intrigue these people? What concerns do they have?”
Given the problems facing our world right now, we hope that the future generation will be concerned and proactive about the global issues threatening our planet. To tackle these problems, we need individuals who are not just subject-matter experts, but also socially conscious change-makers. This is why, Twin’s vision was clear from the beginning: Raising compassionate and competent individuals who can apply their STEM+A knowledge for the betterment of the planet. These will be “double-winged” individuals, flying freely and confidently with compassion and competence. All of our content is developed with this vision in mind and in heart.
So, how do we get there?
Having a vision is great but formulating a system is vital to moving towards that vision with consistency. Our system is our educational approach.
This approach takes its roots back to 2010, when we started out as a social responsibility project and conducted hours of fieldwork with over 20,000 children. The insight we gained during our fieldwork was further developed based on findings in the learning sciences literature and finalised with our planet’s needs in mind. In a lot of ways, our educational approach encompasses everything that traditional schooling is criticised for lacking.
Twin provides sustainability & environmental education with STEM kits and apps using a 3P approach:
Purpose-driven: By linking its content to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, and introducing children to STEM+A solutions, Twin inspires kids to become creative and curious problem-solvers who can think bigger than themselves to tackle the world’s problems.
Playful: Twin introduces children to complex concepts using a play-based approach. Through games, interactive videos and hands-on activities, children can learn while having fun and apply their knowledge to real-life situations.
Personalised: Whether it’s coding or marine biology, children can find something that excites them on Twin. By tagging each activity with relevant skills and subject areas, Twin tracks children’s interest areas and provides personalised skill reports.
Given our philosophy, we make sure that the content we produce;
Sparks children’s curiosity,
Offers hands-on learning experiences,
Puts the focus on skill development rather than knowledge acquisition,
Promotes sustainability education by covering the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
Physical Meets the Digital
In the age of technology, we must use the benefits of technology to enhance children’s learning experiences and broaden their horizons. However, we cannot discount the skills developed by physical experiences. Therefore, the future of education calls for a hybrid approach where physical activities can be enhanced by digital technologies. Twin’s physical STEM kits and digital STEM app are designed to do just that.
Our physical kits create the perfect playground for kids to test their ideas and put on their innovator hats. Children can upload their hands-on projects to the Twin digital app and share it with a community of enthusiastic learners. The Twin app incorporates hundreds of activities, interactive videos and games designed to engage children and spark their curiosity so that they can learn while having fun. Children get to hear from real-life role models including software developers, marine biologists and polar explorers. This way, screen time turns into an exploration time for kids.
Twenty years from now, we’d like to see a generation of fearless leaders who seek justice and prosperity for all. We take a big step forward towards this vision of tomorrow by educating our children today. Our educational approach is our vehicle and our vision is our guiding star.
In today’s world, poverty still affects the lives of people from developing countries and creates a generational cycle of poverty that doesn’t end within one generation. But, believe it or not, STEM education can help to solve the problem of poverty within the world by providing children with the right kind of knowledge. Let’s further explore how STEM+A education can create a difference within the world!
What is Generational Poverty?
Even though we are living in the 21st century, unfortunately poverty and income inequality are still a part of our lives, especially within the developing countries. Poverty affects a huge part of people’s lives and doesn’t limit itself to one specific generation as once it starts affecting a certain group of people, it generally continues from generation to generation. Poverty can show its face in many ways, whether it be in the form of lack of food, shelter or lack of education. Even though the lack of education seems to be the most bearable one when compared to lack of food and shelter, lack of education can create a domino effect in people’s lives.
A UNESCO study shows that if all of the people within the low-income or developing countries had simple reading skills, close to 171 million people could have escaped poverty. By creating a problem of generational poverty, lack of education starts a domino effect between generations. Generational poverty refers to the situation when a family experiences poverty for more than two generations. While one generation doesn’t have access to high quality education that could have provided them with high paying, qualified jobs, they end up having low paying, unreliable jobs. Yet, it doesn’t end up with their own generation. When these people have children, as their parents wouldn’t have the resources to provide them with a high-quality education that would pave the way for high paying jobs for them, these children will follow the footsteps of their parents and end up having low paying jobs as well. And this will create a cycle of poverty and will continue from generation to generation until one parent stops the cycle and provides their children with the education that the 21st century requires. And that kind of education is the STEM+A education in our world.
How can STEM+A Education Help to End Poverty?
STEM+A education provides children with the abilities that the 21st century world requires them to have. As we always say, we are living in the age of technology, so science and technology is and will be part of both our professional and daily lives today and in the upcoming decades. Whether they want to pursue a career in a STEM-related field or not, children need to have the basic skills that STEM education provides, no matter how unrelated the field they want to work in could be from a field in science, technology, mathematics and engineering. Like we mentioned earlier, education can pave the way for upward mobility for children by giving them a chance to acquire higher paying jobs. If we want to narrow this claim a bit further, we can say that STEM education can reduce or entirely end poverty by helping them improve their living standards.
When one generation manages to get a proper STEM education that would make the children of that generation more acquainted with technology and science, this would definitely increase their chances of finding a more qualified and high-paying job than the generations that came before them. And that would break the cycle of generational poverty that is the main reason behind the lack of education that most children experience, especially in rural and developing regions of the world.
What is the Role of Technology in Poverty Reduction?
In today’s world, technology stands against poverty. But how can we manage to get more people to take such proactive measures like helping their kids acquire a proper STEM education that makes technology a part of their lives? The answer is easy: with the help of Ed-Tech and Tech4Good companies and their products. Even though most schools, including the public schools, try to shape their curriculum to be more STEM oriented, affording to enroll children in schools that has a specific curriculum for STEM education is still rather expensive. Companies that develop applications and produce kits to substitute the STEM education on an extracurricular level are the best solution for that problem. Sending your child to a private school with a STEM curriculum might be expensive but compared to that, making use of such applications and kits to make your child warm up to STEM and technology and have a solid STEM foundation that would help them to have higher paying jobs is much more affordable.
In the age of technology children should have the 21st century skills at their hand to be able to provide solutions to today’s problems. Twin offers kids to break this cycle of poverty – more specifically generational poverty- with its application and STEM kits. Offering kids a chance to get a STEM education on a more affordable level, Twin helps to make education what it should be: a way to bring equality into the world. Being a strong proponent of a double-winged education for children —meaning raising individuals with a qualified background both academically and morally—Twin helps children in developing countries to have access to science and technology by backing up projects such as World Science Movement. Being a social responsibility project, the World Science Movement aims to help children with disadvantaged backgrounds that suffer from the consequences of generational poverty from all around the world acquire 21st century STEM skills.
With such information at hand, we can say that a quality education, more specifically a STEM oriented education that meets the standards of the 21st century, can help to end the generational poverty cycle that is the number one reason behind educational poverty and lack of quality education and consequently quality careers for children. Poverty feeds on inequality and if we manage to end this cycle of inequality by breaking it with the help of a quality STEM oriented education that would raise problem solving individuals with a critical thinking mindset, we can break the barriers that confines people to living with low standards and working for low paying jobs that are far behind what they should be and what they deserve. Making children have access to quality education being one of UN’s Sustainable Development Goals to be achieved by the year of 2030, Twin helps to make those goals come true by harnessing science and technology for poverty reduction and sustainable development!
By Dr Meryl Batchelder, middle school teacher in Northumberland, UK and TeachSDG Ambassador.
To start, let me make a confession. Even though I’ve been a science teacher for well over a decade, until the pandemic I didn’t really embrace educational technology or ‘EdTech’. The curriculum is busy, I was trying to incorporate more environmental education into my lessons and, although I encouraged the use of iPads for data logging or spreadsheets for plotting graphs, I’d never really found much use for educational IT platforms.
A benefit of the pandemic?
When we went into lockdown suddenly I welcomed EdTech, using several online programs to make my virtual sessions interactive, meaningful and engaging. Much as I missed the daily face-to-face interaction with my pupils, I enjoyed the creative aspects of teaching online and observed many benefits for children. It promoted independent learning, provided opportunities for reflection, options for home-based-hands-on projects and also demonstrated that short lessons with lots of interaction could be highly effective. A kind of edutainment – where the educational lesson is delivered, understood, assessed and, most importantly, sticky for the pupils to hold their attention.
Future skills
As a teacher with an academic background in environmental science, I believe that the purpose of education is to prepare young people for the future. But, even beyond the pandemic, planet Earth is rapidly changing and, depending on where you are in the world, many schools are not yet teaching pupils to be competent in how to use STEM+A (science, technology, engineering, mathematics + art) to solve complex problems or even to develop a meaningful social conscience. This means they might lack essential future skills and be ill-prepared for the challenging times ahead.
To ensure the children in my classroom, whether virtual or in person, understand the concept of living sustainably, I have brought the UN Sustainable Development Goals into my lessons, linking all topics to at least one of these Global Goals. The SDG’s are an internationally agreed set of 17 objectives which act as a holistic blueprint for peace and prosperity, for people and the planet. They include aims for Zero Hunger (SDG2), Clean Water and Sanitation for all (SDG6), Responsible Consumption (SDG12) and Climate Action (SDG13).
Providing a quality education
If we really want to support young people we need to move with the times and that is where new developments in EdTech, encompassing education for climate change and sustainability, can prove highly effective. SDG4 is for Quality Education and Target 4.7 of the goal states that by 2030, we should ensure that all learners acquire the knowledge and skills needed to promote sustainable development, including education, sustainable lifestyles, human rights, gender equality, promotion of a culture of peace, global citizenship and an appreciation of cultural diversity. EdTech can really give young people an advantage as we wait for international educational strategies to catch up.
Twin Science is a vibrant EdTech startup which embodies all that is good with EdTech. There is the Twin App which allows teachers to set and track hands-on homework and intelligent quizzes, education kits where students learn crucial concepts like coding, robotics and AI with a plethora of curriculum-aligned lessons. The company has hosted interactive shows live on YouTube produced with Imperial College London and the Royal Academy of Engineering and has recently been selected as a 2022 TechPioneer by the World Economic Forum. They are definitely an EdTech company to watch!
A sticky app to promote sustainability
The Twin App is dynamic and hugely engaging. It provides STEM+A Challenges that pupils can do at home or in the classroom. There are 5 minute Discovery Bits, in which an enormous range of young people, teachers and professionals share short lessons via interactive videos. These are aligned to the SDGs and include a vast array of topics which address the problems, and more importantly the solutions, that can help young people face the challenges ahead. There are ‘lessons’ on autonomous vehicles, robot bees, biomimicry in architecture, novel developments in renewable energy and even the anatomy of jellyfish. Learning through these videobites is much more interesting to young people than the dry objectives in many national curricula. There is even a Discovery Bit created by Antony Jinman, a polar explorer, helping to raise awareness about climate change and the amount of new content is growing as more enthusiastic creators join the team.
Within the Twin App there are also DIY projects that young people can undertake in school or at home, thousands of STEM trivia questions along with a safe & moderated platform that can be opted out if necessary. The app encourages project based learning and allows children to play games, earn coins and level up. Teachers or parents can even access childrens’ monthly skill reports. We all know that many young people love playing on electronic devices but they also love to learn, why not channel their time and energy into something tangible?
Hands-on kits to challenge and engage
In another feat of creativity Twin Science have also developed Twin Robotic Kits which immerse young inventors into the world of robotics and coding. The World Economic Forum announced Twin as one of the eight winners of the inaugural Smart Toy Awards in 2021. Today’s children are the adults of the future, a future shaped by artificial intelligence and robotic technologies. These coding kits, where they can learn the basics of robotic technologies with fun experiments, are based on Arduino technology and allow children to do described experiments or independently-led projects with LEGO™ compatible modules. There is a fabulous education kit that I’m just getting started with my pupils on projects that link to the KS2 and KS3 national curriculum.
Promoting conscience and competence
The company’s philosophy aligns with my own, aiming to improve the ‘future skills’ of children such as problem-solving & critical thinking to understand and question the global-scale problems, creative thinking to generate solutions and innovations to these problems, a sense of social responsibility to care about these problems in the first place and the self-confidence & growth-mindset to tackle these problems with a hopeful attitude. Twin Science also adopts an holistic approach to education and links everything to real life in order to get children to think about how to tackle global problems at a systems-level.
Shaped by insight from working with thousands of children, Twin Science has a STEM4Good approach to inspire children. The app and kits encourage children to actively think, stay curious and keep questioning to prepare them for tomorrow’s challenges and jobs; design and creativity, drawing and imagination, exploration and curiosity, robotics and problem solving, observational and reasoning and communication and self awareness. This platform is transformational for teaching!
It’s wonderful that the company also has a huge social conscience. For each digital subscription purchased, they give one digital subscription to a child from an economically disadvantaged background. For each kit purchased, they donate a portion to the World Science Movement (WSM), which aims to give children in emergent nations better access to STEM education.
Changing with the times
Despite being a relatively old teacher in age, I’m a new advocate for EdTech. To address issues such as climate change and biodiversity loss young people will need practical skills needed in order to transition towards a net zero lifestyle alongside creative thinking and develop technological solutions in the future. Where better to start than early in their journey through school? Twin Science is suitable for children of ages 7 to 12. Problem solving will build resilience and give pupils the ability to cope with, and rise to, the inevitable challenges and set-backs they will meet in the course of their lives, and come back stronger from them.
Finally, as a parent of two teenagers soon to depart for university to study STEM subjects, I just wish Twin Science had been founded a decade ago. Then my children, and I, could have benefited from this technology. They would have loved the meaningful, sticky edutainment provided by the app and kits or recommended ideas for practical hands-on projects would have kept them busy. Nonetheless, as a teacher, I still have the time to embrace EdTech and transform my teaching.
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