‘Sustainability Starts with Teachers’ is an innovative UNESCO-led capacity-building programme for southern African teacher educators in Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE), Primary and Secondary Education, and Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET) from 11 countries. It responds to regional sustainable development concerns and opportunities, the Africa 2063 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). As a direct outcome of this project, ‘culture-specific’ resource material for teachers was developed, aiming at providing teachers with practical tools on how to integrate living heritage in the classroom.
4 lesson plans have been co-developed with the insights of teachers who have piloted them in their classrooms.
This lesson plan under is suitable for students from grade 9th-12th. It is titled - ‘Intangible Cultural Heritage Lesson Plan for Sustainable Development: Science-Based Methods and Indigenous Knowledge and Cultural Practices of Predicting Weather’. In this lesson, students will learn about methods using scientific principles and indigenous knowledge and cultural practices used to predict the weather. The indigenous weather prediction methods highlighted in this activity come from a study involving farmers in South Africa. They will explore how these practices reveal changes in the climate and will learn about how meteorologists create the forecasts that are broadcast on TV and radio. They will also examine indigenous weather indicators that farmers and others have used in Southern Africa for generations, and compare and contrast these traditional methods to the contemporary weather-prediction methods. Finally, students will reflect on what they have learned and write a short response during the class.
To explore the other lessons plans developed under this project, click on the links below:
- Intangible Cultural Heritage Lesson Plan: Diketo
- Intangible Cultural Heritage Lesson Plan: Tonga Proverbs on Water
- Intangible Cultural Heritage Lesson Plan: Dance as Living Heritage ’