After-School Energy Classes Teach Students to Design Solar-Powered Gadgets

Lim Eun-hee, a chemistry trainer at Younghoon High School in Seoul’s Gangbuk district, makes use of after-school hours to run power lessons for college students. Students not solely construct renewable power units similar to solar energy programs and hydrogen gasoline cells themselves, but additionally share appropriate-technology concepts about which applied sciences might finest be utilized in locations with inadequate energy grids, similar to Africa, and conduct experiments straight.

These “high-quality energy classes,” that are troublesome to supply at extraordinary colleges, are made attainable by the “Energy Literacy Education Teacher Research Group” (hereinafter Teacher Research Group) program run by the Korea Energy Information Culture Foundation, a corporation below the Ministry of Climate, Energy and Environment. “Energy education is important, but there are limits to how much an individual teacher can create teaching materials reflecting the latest issues and teach them in the field,” Lim stated. “Thanks to the foundation’s accumulated educational content and the Teacher Research Group network, I was able to develop diverse curricula and apply them in actual classes.”

According to the muse on the twenty first, the Energy Literacy Education Teacher Research Group program, now in its third 12 months, selects about 20 analysis teams every year to assist power lessons at elementary, center and excessive colleges. Once a analysis group made up of 5 or extra incumbent elementary and secondary faculty lecturers is chosen, the muse offers coaching and helps lecturers recurrently trade concepts and develop power education schemes and studying supplies tailor-made to their themes. This 12 months’s analysis matters for the Teacher Research Group include local weather change and power, power safety, and power combine.

The basis stepped in to assist colleges as a result of power can’t be sufficiently realized inside the common curriculum. It judged that appropriate-level schooling is required from elementary by means of highschool at a time when securing secure power and an power combine is essential within the synthetic intelligence (AI) period.

Rather than merely instructing idea, this system guides college students to find power issues on their very own and discover options. One Younghoon High School pupil designed a “cool umbrella,” which attaches a versatile photo voltaic panel to the floor of an umbrella and runs a present by means of it to function a mini air conditioner.

International exchanges are additionally actively carried out. Kim Jang-cheol, a trainer at Guui Elementary School in Seoul’s Guro district, which was chosen for this 12 months’s Teacher Research Group, plans subsequent month to go to a neighborhood elementary faculty within the Philippines, the place typhoons and warmth waves are frequent, to run an in-person joint worldwide class. “Through the Teacher Research Group, I plan to develop educational materials on various energy sources such as nuclear power, renewable energy and liquefied natural gas (LNG), and apply them in field classes,” Kim stated. “I expect this will be an opportunity for elementary school students to view energy issues from a global perspective.”

The basis additionally plans to push for institutional enhancements in order that power schooling could be additional expanded in colleges. For instance, simply as environmental schooling is necessary in elementary and center colleges, power schooling would even be made obligatory. In addition, the muse plans to proceed supporting power schooling in colleges by means of the Teacher Research Group and to run varied applications to strengthen lecturers’ capabilities.

Lee Ju-su, CEO of the Korea Energy Information Culture Foundation, stated, “In an era of energy transition and climate crisis response, it is more important than anything for future generations to correctly understand energy and cultivate energy literacy.” He added, “We will continue to discover and spread excellent educational content that can be used in schools.”