On your marks, get set, GOose!
The Green Goose Chase is one way I've helped others tap into a state of joy in the service of climate action.
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Why play
playground (not battleground) thinking
Playful Climate Action takes a different approach is grounded in positive psychology and play-based learning theory. It seeks to empower people to envision and create the thriving, regenerative world we all want.
Climate change and playfulness? You can't be serious.
Look, working on climate change is Serious Business. Unfortunately, our approach to Serious Business has been dominated by a battleground mentality. This approach leaves many of us feeling depleted, steeped in doom and gloom, and reluctant to keep going or, worse, engage at all.
Alternatively, Playful Climate Action approaches the Serious Business of climate work with a playground mentality. Playgrounds tap into our innate sense of joy, wonder, and delight, sparking our creativity, connecting us to others, and leaving us feeling renewed.*
*Spoiler alert: A playground mentality is not about glitter storms, rainbow-farting unicorns, and other forms of toxic positivity, so if you're looking for unrepentant optimism about climate change, look elsewhere.
We believe in the power of
joy and delight
in bringing about the
regenerative, thriving world
we all want.
What we do
we take climate change seriously.
we take ourselves less seriously.
We use playfulness and playful learning to empower climate-focused leaders, green teams, educators, and organizations of all types already dabbling (or wanting to dabble) in the climate space to:
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reignite their motivation and energy for climate work.
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cultivate personal resilience and avoid burnout.
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counteract pervasive doom & gloom.
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get unstuck or get started, no matter where they are on their climate work journey.
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engage internal or external stakeholders with climate work.
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build a supportive community of climate thinkers and doers.
Our workplayshops are highly interactive and, well, playful. Depending on your goals, we might incorporate tools like:
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LEGO® Serious Play®
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Awe walks
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C-Roads climate change policy simulation
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Climate change-themed games
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Interactive, app-based Goose Chase scavenger hunts
Sound interesting?
Let's play!
...if we want to make it safely and sanely through all the changes coming our way, we're going to need to come out and play.
-Bernie DeKoven
game designer, fun theorist
Contact
meet the person behind
Playful Climate Action
Hello! I'm Casey Meehan, a U.S. based sustainability professional, educator and SERIOUSWORK certified facilitator of LEGO Serious Play.
I believe that joy and delight are our collective superpowers in responding to the world's biggest challenges. I've spent over a decade helping organizations engage with stakeholders around climate change using my background in psychology and my PhD focused on climate change education.
Playtime for me includes trail running, exploring the outdoors with my partner and two boys, and juggling. Not all at the same time. Yet.
I'd love to connect. I've found talking about climate change to be the perfect ice breaker. (See what I did there?) 😂
Casey Meehan, PhD
Meet Casey
The opposite of work is not play. it's depression.
-Brian Sutton-Smith, PhD
play theorist
Resources
Resources
Books
Featured post
Print resources about how we respond to the climate crisis, the importance of joy and play, or both.
The Power of Fun: How to Feel Alive Again (2021) Catherine Price
A Field Guide to Climate Anxiety: How to Keep Your Cool on a Warming Planet (2020)
Sarah Jaquette Ray
The Book of Delights: Essays (2020) Ross Gay
A Playful Path (2014) (Available for free at aplayfulpath.com) Bernard DeKoven
Hope Matters: Why Changing the Way We Think is Critical to Solving the Climate Crisis (2020)
Elin Kelsey
Black Joy: Stories of Resistance, Resilience, and Restoration (2022) Tracey M. Lewis-Giggetts
Play: How it Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul (2010)
Stuart Brown & Christopher Vaughan
Playful Intelligence:The Power of Living Lightly in a Serious World (2018) Anthony DeBenedet
Joyful: The Surprising Power of Ordinary Things to Create Extraordinary Happiness (2018)
Ingrid Fettel Lee
Michael Rosen's Book of Play! Why Play Really Matters, and 101 Ways to Get More of It in Your Life (2019) Michael Rosen
Games, websites and other playful things...
Greenhouse Game: Our Home is in Your Hands https://www.greenhousegame.com/
World Climate Simulation (C-Roads) https://www.climateinteractive.org/tools/world-climate-simulation/
Your Climate Journey https://growing-greener.org/
How Bad are Bananas? https://bananasgame.co.uk/
A deep, flexible, fun and engaging way of learning about your own carbon impacts. Needs a facilitator to work well and is based on the popular science book by Professor Mike Berners-Lee.
Can Your Reach Net Zero? https://ig.ft.com/climate-game/
Climate Adam
With a PhD in climate science from Oxford, Adam Levy tries to make sense of climate change with humor-filled YouTube videos.
deepFUN.com
The late Bernie DeKoven's site including a blog about play and a collection games designed to help us practice playfulness.
Inside the Greenhouse
Students at the University of Colorado develop climate change-related sketch comedy for a class on creative climate communication. This is part of a larger project called "Inside the Greenhouse.
EarthGames is a growing community of researchers, game developers and students who share a passion for games and the environment. Here is a collection of their games.
From the blog
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