CLIMATE CONVERSATIONS TOOLKIT
The #1 Priority of SCAN! is Organizing and Mobilizing.
This toolkit is for organizers and everyone who wants to take ACTION, talking to groups and organizations, recruiting them into the climate movement and SCAN! You, working with a buddy, already have all the knowledge, skills, talent, experience, and empathy to do this.
.Your discoveries in facilitating these unique Climate Conversations will change the discourse on the climate crisis. This toolkit is a lot more creative and fun than you imagine: Sample Agendas, Program Activities, Slide Decks, Articles, Flyers – and Action! All the materials relate to the coaching/learning SENIORS TALKING CLIMATE workshops SCAN! offers to people becoming speakers/organizers. By Jane Adams, M.Ed., Seniors Talking Climate Project.
Click HERE to see the introductory video.
Chapter 1/Welcome! How to Use This Toolkit
SCAN’S main priority is: Organize seniors to build the movement for emergency Action now, which is what this toolkit is charged with doing. The collective approach to organizing in the toolkit is in response to a world-wide problem, fully documented: Telling FACTS often fails to get people – including us – to take action. So, if we do a lot less Telling, we should do a lot more Asking! This unique material is all about how to turn Asking into an organizing and action strategy.
Chapter 2/Sample Agendas
Just to jump right in … Here’s how you can organize your Agenda, whatever Activities you like as well as the practical stuff like timing, IT, and who does what AND your TO DO list! In this chapter are Agenda examples – various real-life designs – which you can use in any way. There are many potential variations, plus those of your own invention! This might be one of the most creative processes you and your buddy have ever been in! You will BOTH be thrilled and proud when a Climate Conversation really goes well.
Chapter 3/Program Activities
Program Activities are items in your Agenda that do most of the work! They are NOT about content such as information, instruction, or planning. Here are six collective activities that are interactive, fun, and sometimes surprising, with tips on how to facilitate them. They all involve everyone doing a lot of the talking: the goal is to have people do three quarters of the talking in any conversation! Each activity can play out for you in dozens of ways, including any new ideas you create.
Chapter 4/Slide Decks
I have to say I got carried away with these slide decks. I tried to imagine basic information that you might have occasion to use in one of your Climate Conversations, but so many things I read are fascinating enough to need their own slide! You have access to all eleven of them, so make up your own slide deck. Choose two or three from here, or two or three from there, based on what you have in mind and the Needs Assessment of the group.
Chapter 5/Articles and Flyers
In the course of designing and delivering the three-workshop series SENIORS TALKING CLIMATE – for speakers/organizers – there was never enough time to spend on the very rich opinions, research, and experiences that have led me and others to this collective approach. I wrote these nine Articles, linked into the writing of the Chapters above. Here I would especially be grateful for your FEEDBACK! No other organization has the “last word” on organizing. This is unique. Let’s continue to enrich the discourse!