ELA Lesson: Non-Dairy Milk & Environmental Data
Lesson Plan
1 hour 50 minutesGrades6, 7, 8English Language Arts
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Written by Sevda Sadik
About this lesson
In this lesson, students evaluate whether non-dairy milk is an effective technological solution to the environmental impacts of dairy production. Using real nutrition and environmental data, they compare dairy and non-dairy options before making an evidence-based recommendation for their school cafeteria.
Inquire: Students share what they already know about dairy and non-dairy milk and make an initial prediction about which milk is least harmful to the environment.
Investigate: Students read an introductory article, analyze environmental and nutritional data, explore technologies designed to improve non-dairy options, and identify which alternative makes the strongest case for replacing dairy.
Inspire: Students use the data to create a flyer recommending a specific non-dairy milk for their school cafeteria, then share and compare recommendations as a class.
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Suggestions
- The Investigate and Inspire sections can be completed on separate days or class periods. Alternatively, the flyer in the Inspire section can be assigned for homework.
- This lesson works well as a stand-alone lesson or as part of a larger unit across multiple subjects:
- Science: environmental impact, resource use, and food systems
- Health or Nutrition: comparing dietary options and understanding nutritional content
- Math: graph interpretation, ratio and rate reasoning, and data comparison
- ELA: argument writing, using evidence from informational and technical texts, and making claims supported by data
- Social Studies: food access, agricultural systems, consumer choices, and the social and economic factors that shape what communities eat
- This is a good introductory lesson for students to practice data analysis and trade-off reasoning to build skills across multiple subjects.
- Flyers can be used as concrete student action, posted on school grounds, or submitted to the cafeteria or administration to increase awareness.
- Students can share their flyers with the student government or sustainability club, or develop a recommendation pitch to present.
- The Milk Cheat Sheet can be printed and used as a visual anchor throughout the lesson.
- Students can research other new technologies designed to improve non-dairy milk, such as fortification processes, precision fermentation, or new plant sources.
Prerequisites
- The lesson highlights that "better for the environment" is nuanced and that different non-dairy milks trade one problem for another. Teachers should be prepared to use this as a teaching moment about how data-informed decisions require weighing multiple factors, not just finding a single "right" answer.
- Depending on grade level, teachers may need to make adjustments prior to teaching the lesson. Sixth graders may need more scaffolding, modeling, or direct teaching on interpreting graphs. Eighth graders could work more independently and go deeper into the science article and technology evaluation.
- Teachers should review the Student Survey and make a copy of the Google Form, replacing the link in the Teacher Slideshow before class.
- Teachers may need to clarify the meaning of “dairy” and “non-dairy” to students.
- Teachers should be prepared to briefly explain eutrophication, as it is consistently used in the data. This article provides a brief description of eutrophication.
- Students should have a basic or working understanding of what greenhouse gases are and how human activity contributes to climate change at a general level.
- Students should be comfortable reading a bar graph or comparing values across a simple chart.
- Some familiarity with nutrition labels or basic nutritional content, such as protein, fat, calcium is helpful but not required.
Differentiation
- For students needing more support:
- Provide a structured comparison chart with the four environmental measures pre-written (greenhouse gases, land use, freshwater use, eutrophication)
- Pre-select two or three milk types for students to compare
- Provide sentence starters for the flyer
- Allow students to focus on one environmental measure and one nutritional measure
- For students needing a challenge:
- Students can find one additional data source beyond those provided and evaluate its credibility before incorporating it into their flyer.
- Require students to address a counterargument in their flyer, acknowledging the strongest case for dairy or a competing non-dairy option, and then explain why their recommendation is still best.
- Students can research the cost per serving of each milk type and factor that into their recommendation, adding an economic dimension to the trade-off analysis.
- Students can expand their flyer argument and write a one-page brief addressed to the school principal or cafeteria director.
- Students can research a newer or emerging non-dairy technology, such as precision fermentation or lab-grown dairy, and evaluate whether it addresses the limitations of current plant-based options.
- Students can explore the more advanced table in the science article or look through FoodData Central if that is too advanced.
From the scientist review
Milk sourced from cows has, by far, the largest environmental impact of all of the milk options. But when it comes to the non-dairy competitors, there is no clear winner, as this lesson investigates. All of the resources in this lesson have passed the scientific review process.
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About the teacher writer
Sevda Sadik
Sevda worked with SubjectToClimate to develop one science and design thinking lesson for grades 6-8.
