CHOOSE YOUR STORY
Climate and Environment includes stories about climate change and environmental damage, the communities most impacted, and how people are resisting and building solutions. Explore the stories below to find one that moves you. Then, use this worksheet to support you with writing your Fighting Words poem.
Stories for Grades 3 and Up
| Story | Media | Publication | Content Warnings |
| “State of Change: How Planting Grasslands Fights Climate Change” by Michelle Lotker | Video, Photo, Text | PBS North Carolina | N/A |
| “Saving Wildlife: Education Key to Changing Mindsets” by Audrey Tan | Text | The Straits Times | N/A |
| “I Visited a Beautiful Coral Reef in 2022. What I Saw There This Summer Shocked Me.” by Benji Jones and Jennifer Adler | Photo, Text | Vox | N/A |
Stories for Grades 6 and Up
| Story | Media | Publication | Content Warnings |
| “Dispossessed by Climate—Iraqi Refugees in Their Own Country” by Susan Schulman | Photo, Text | The Markaz Review | N/A |
| “Portraits of Drought: Farmers Struggle To Adapt to Arid Conditions in Kunene” by Mandile Mpofu | Photo, Text | Pulitzer Center | N/A |
| “Saving Our Soil” by Fernando Figueroa | Photo, Text | WUFT | N/A |
| “Spain: A Coastal Landscape Dies” by Tobias Landwehr | Video, Photo, Text | Süddeutsche Zeitung | N/A |
| “After Mangroves Disappear, Sumatran Village Braces for Worsening Tidal Waves” by Tonggo Simangunsong | Photo, Text | The Jakarta Post | N/A |
| “How Extreme Heat Impacts Your Brain and Mental Health” by Aryn Baker | Text | TIME Magazine | Discussion of suicide and mental health crises |
Stories for Grades 9 and Up
| Story | Media | Publication | Content Warnings |
| “Climate Change Is Driving a Global Youth Revolution” by Sara Miller Llana and Stephanie Hanes | Photo, Text | The Christian Science Monitor | N/A |
| “Why Are Alaska’s Rivers Turning Orange?” by Alec Luhn | Photo, Text | Scientific American | N/A |
| “The World’s Best Rainforest Guardians Already Live There” by Peter Yeung | Photo, Text | The Washington Post | N/A |
| “Pulled From the Deep: Scientists Found a ‘Lost’ Deep-Sea Mining Site off the SC Coast. What Secrets Does it Hold?” by Clare Fieseler | Photo, Text | The Post and Courier | N/A |
| “Brazil: Only a Lighthouse Remains” by Tobias Landwehr | Video, Photo, Text | Süddeutsche Zeitung | N/A |
| “King of the Damned: The Fight for Water in the Fertile Crescent” by Hannah Lucinda Smith | Photo, Text | Foreign Policy | N/A |
| “Prolonged Drought Brings Famine, Death, and Fear to Somalia” by Cara Anna | Photo, Text | Associated Press | Images of malnourished children |
| “Turkey’s Honey Apocalypse Is a Warning to the World” by Katie Nadworny and Özge Sebzeci | Photo, Text | The Atlantic | N/A |
| “In Central America, a Booming Economy Comes At a Cost” by Anusha Mathur | Photo, Text | POLITICO Magazine | N/A |
| “In the Name of Sustainability, Cambodia Risks Its ‘Final Frontier’ of Biodiversity” by Anton Delgado | Photo, Text | The Japan Times | N/A |
| “‘A Frenzy of Bodies in the Chamber of Death’: Italian Fishers Fight To Preserve an Ancient Tradition” by Sandali Handagama and Agostino Petroni | Photo, Text | The Guardian | Images of fish being gutted |
