"Our vision is wise, compassionate citizens with the power to make a difference. We are very much a school where our vision and values are lived, not laminated."

At St Ebbe's Primary School in Oxfordshire, climate education doesn’t sit in a slot on the timetable. It breathes through the whole school.

Co-headteachers Tina Farr and Clare Whyles describe a school environment shaped as much by emotional literacy as by curriculum design. "Our vision is wise, compassionate citizens with the power to make a difference," Farr says. "We are very much a school where our vision and values are lived, not laminated."

Three values underpin the St Ebbe's approach: curiosity, courage, and connection. But connection, they explain, is the foundation of everything. Connection to ourselves, to one another, and to the living world. Without that, neither the emotionally vulnerable work nor the difficult truths of the climate crisis can be held safely. This understanding – underpinned by the ThoughtBox Triple Wellbeing approach of self-care, people-care, and earth-care – drives what they call their "curriculum of hope". It's a whole-school, inquiry-based approach shaped around big, open questions and rooted in children's real concerns about the world.

Sustainability and a relationship with nature emerged organically during a redesign of the curriculum. It wasn’t an add-on, but reflected what teachers and children felt mattered most. Whyles sums up the culture simply: "There's a really big emphasis on children's emotional literacy and relationships, trusting relationships… Children just feeling able to share their passions, their concerns, the things that worry them about the world."

This depth of trust allows pupils to explore heavy issues without being overwhelmed. Projects begin with "three Ps" – a person, in a place, with a problem – but St Ebbe's insists on a fourth: possibilities. "We acknowledge the challenges," Whyles says, "but then it's very much, okay, what are people doing? Especially young people… what are they doing in their own communities that's making a difference?"

The projects are striking. Year 2’s inquiry, Who owns the air?, leads children into questions about borders, responsibility and fairness. Year 4’s Do we have the power to change the world? introduces role models tackling environmental issues. Year 5 asks, Can one person make a difference? and culminates in TED-style talks on small actions that matter. Even in Reception, children explore awe and wonder: Does everything deserve kindness? and How can we help others find the beauty in our wonderful world?

The emotional impact is felt far beyond the classroom. "Parents say this is having a ripple effect in the home. And, you know, children, they take it seriously because they're being taken seriously." At learning exhibitions, pupils stand confidently beside their work, not seeking praise but wanting to educate their families. "They’ve got something important to say," Whyles notes. "They want their audience, so they badger their parents to come along."

This sense of agency is nurtured by a relational style of leadership, with Farr and Whyles seeing the school as a "living, organic system". St Ebbe's has deliberately dissolved the hierarchy that often defines school life. Staff training happens in circles, with a plant in the middle and snacks shared between everyone. "If you want teachers to show up in that way in the classroom, we have to show up like that for them," Farr says. Vulnerability is modelled openly: teachers are encouraged to say when they don’t have all the answers and children see adults practising the same courage and humility expected of them.

The result is a culture where speaking truth to power feels normal. Farr recalls a Year 4 pupil approaching her after assembly to challenge why a supposedly eco-conscious school had laminated display letters. "I love that she just felt that she could come up and ask me that," she laughs.

St Ebbe's’ approach doesn’t reject rigour or complexity. Instead, it avoids the trap of reducing climate education to fear or technical knowledge alone. The aim is to develop critical, curious thinkers who can hold uncertainty and grapple with difficult feelings. Whyles explains that children often don't come with a fixed opinion. "They're willing to stay in the middle ground for longer. That’s a really important skill going forward."

The school’s leaders are clear about the systemic obstacles: high-stakes testing, an overloaded curriculum, and narrow definitions of attainment all stifle the kind of compassionate, relational work they believe is essential. Yet they remain determined to use what freedom they do have. "We are freer than perhaps a lot of school leaders think we are," Farr says.

At St Ebbe's, climate education is a way of cultivating citizens who feel safe enough to care, and courageous enough to act. In a time of rising ecological anxiety among young people, their approach offers something rare: a model that holds emotional truth, intellectual rigour and collective possibility together.

This case study was written by Sarah Trott.