Indirect Impacts of Climate Change
Provided by: OER Project|Published on: August 29, 2025|Last updated: September 26, 2026
Grades: 9, 10, 11, 12
Type: Lesson Plans
Subjects: Civics, Geography, Health
Authors: OER Project: Climate
Location: Earth
This resource has been reviewed by SubjectToClimate's climate scientists and verified for scientific accuracy and up-to-date information. Learn about our review process →
This resource has been reviewed by SubjectToClimate's climate scientists and verified for scientific accuracy and up-to-date information. Learn about our review process →
Synopsis
- In this module from the OER Project: Climate, students will learn about the indirect impacts caused by the effects of climate change, focusing on health and environmental justice.
- Students will understand how pre-existing inequalities make climate change impacts disproportionately felt around the world, and how climate change impacts will cause health problems for many people.
- This is one of many lessons in the online Climate course by OER Project.
Teaching Materials
Positives
- Understanding the difference between correlation and causation is an important skill for students to utilize in their daily lives beyond the classroom.
- This module includes opportunities for students to have some autonomy in what they produce and study.
Prerequisites
- Students should be familiar with climate change and its impacts.
- The Health Impacts of Climate Change activity asks students to read a chapter from a linked reading. This link may be broken. Teachers can find the resource here.
- Discussing climate impacts and life-threatening circumstances may bring up difficult emotions for students. Teachers should support these students and allow them time to process their feelings as needed.
Differentiation & Implementation
- To learn more about environmental justice and redlining discussed in this module's video, teachers can use this lesson.
- Teachers can have students check the box under the video to pause it periodically and ask questions about key points. Students can record their responses on a piece of paper.
- After finishing this module, students can discuss how indirect impacts of climate change are interconnected with various aspects of society. Teachers can illustrate this by having students create a similar graphic to the opening activity, this time using the UN Sustainable Development Goals and showing how they are connected by climate change and its impacts, both direct and indirect. Teachers may want to fill in hexagons with Goal 3, Good Health and Well-Being, Goal 7, Affordable and Clean Energy, Goal 10, Reduced Inequalities, and Goal 13, Climate Action. Students can fill in the remaining spaces with the impacts discussed throughout the module.
This resource expertly links the science of climate change with environmental and climate justice. The commonly misunderstood difference between causation and correlation is discussed at length. The only issue in this resource is a single broken link to the assessment mentioned in the lesson 2.3 activity, though it was easily found with a Google search. This resource is recommended for teaching.
Teaching Tips
Standards
Resource Type and Format
Scientist Reviewed
This resource has been reviewed by SubjectToClimate's climate scientists and verified for scientific accuracy and up-to-date information. Our review process ensures that every resource in our library reflects the current state of climate science.
Learn about our review process →
