Want Students to Become Climate Stewards? Use These 6 Storytelling Stances!

What if the most powerful climate tool we have isn't a statistic, it's a story?

In Part 1 of my S5E37 @schoolutionspodcast conversation, I sit down with teacher Xochitl Bentley to unpack how using six specific storytelling stances can effectively engage students with climate change issues. Xochitl emphasizes that stories can be a more powerful tool than statistics in fostering environmental education and stewardship, highlighting their role in the broader education for sustainability movement.

Some resources mentioned:
📚 Helping Students Become Climate Stewards: Storytelling for Environmental Advocacy and Problem Solving by Xochitl Bentley
📚 Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor by Rob Nixon
📚The Serviceberry by Robin Wall Kimmerer
📚Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler
➡️Fukushima Daiichi Accident 

CHAPTERS:
0:00 – Introduction & Who Is Xochitl Bentley
1:45 – The Research: Rob Nixon & Slow Violence
3:30 – What Sparked Xochitl's Passion for Climate Stewardship
5:00 – The Food Story That Hooked Students (Heather's Classroom)
6:10 – Lessons from Japan: Foresight, Islands & Sustainability
8:30 – Why Facts Alone Don't Drive Action
9:30 – Wrapping Data in Stories: The Core Argument
10:30 – The Six Storytelling Stances (Overview)
11:00 – Stance 1: Storytelling for Systemic Responsiveness
12:10 – Stance 2: Storytelling About Root Causes
13:10 – Stance 3: Storytelling Beyond Either/Or
14:10 – Stance 4: Storytelling for Kinship & Reciprocity
15:20 – Stance 5: Storytelling for Intergenerational Awareness
16:30 – The Seventh Generation Principle Connection
17:10 – Stance 6: Storytelling for Collective Mobilization
18:10 – Lightning Round Begins
18:45 – Book Rec: The Serviceberry by Robin Wall Kimmerer
19:40 – One Word Students Feel: Overwhelmed
20:10 – Most Underrated Genre: Ghost Stories
21:00 – Biggest Myth in Environmental Education
21:30 – A Student Becomes a Climate Steward When…
22:00 – Wrap Up & What's Coming in Part 2

🎧 Part 2 drops Friday, where Xochitl walks through the full storytelling flow and real climate stewardship projects from her classroom.

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🎵 Music: Benjamin Wahl

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Transcript

Olivia: [00:00:00] What if the most powerful climate tool we have isn't a statistic? It's a story. Today, certified California naturalist, Fulbright exchange educator, and author Xochitl Bentley joins me to break down the six storytelling stances at the heart of her book, Helping Students Become Climate Stewards. We talk about slow violence, ghost stories, why even your most motivated students shut down around climate data, and the one thing a student needs to become a climate steward. This conversation will change the way you think about every unit you teach, no matter your content area. 

This is Schoolutions, the podcast that extends education beyond the classroom. A show that isn't just theory, but practical try-it-tomorrow approaches for educators and caregivers to ensure every student finds their spark [00:01:00] and receives the support they need to thrive. 

I am Olivia Wahl, and I am so happy to welcome Xochitl Bentley to the podcast today. Let me tell you a little bit about Xochitl. Xochitl Bentley is a certified California naturalist and certified California environmental educator. In 2017, she was one of 12 educators chosen for the Fulbright Japan-U.S. Teacher Exchange Program. This opportunity allowed her to learn more about education for sustainable development. Our conversation today will focus on your wonderful book, Xochitl, I have it right here, Helping Students Become Climate Stewards: Storytelling for Environmental Advocacy and Problem Solving. I have been waiting to have you on the podcast for a very long time, and I am so excited to have you join for this conversation. Thank you. 

Xochitl: Thank you for [00:02:00] having me. 

Olivia: Yeah. Yeah. Let's kick off the conversation with a researcher or a piece of research you lean on when you're thinking about climate stewardship.

Xochitl: Yeah. I would say one of the main people that come to mind is Rob Nixon. Uh, among many things he's written, he wrote a book that came out in 2011 called, uh, Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor, and it was really influential in the environmental field. But for me personally, him distinguishing slow violence from, say, fast violence, which can be easy to absorb visually and in, in media sources, was really, really huge in how I thought about the lack of access to substantive climate stories.

But also the inherent challenges in communicating any information about climate challenges, that when you think about the scope of something like deforestation [00:03:00] or the acidification of oceans. These are things that happen over such a long span of time that it's really hard to capture them or reduce them to a three to four-minute news clip. And so him talking about slow violence and the difficulty of representing it, uh, in any sort of media really challenged me to think about, like, how do you hook, uh, you know, the attention of students? How do you keep people's focus on these things that are really hard to absorb in one glance? 

Olivia: Oh, that is so interesting. And that's a perfect segue because my first question for you is what led you to realize that you really wanted to study and explore a passion around climate stewardship? 

Xochitl: So, I find the most inspiration in talking to educators at other schools. So not where I'm teaching, but who are doing great things elsewhere in the world. [00:04:00] And there's something about meeting fellow educators, learning about their very different teaching contexts, and seeing what works with them there. And I heard, um, a fantastic teacher, her name's Heather, she's a, a high school science teacher in Philadelphia. Uh, we've been in touch for about eight years, and she talked about how, um, elevating food stories was a way to hook students and have them think about the environmental toll of the food industry.

And so I realized I'm an English teacher. I always include food stories or food writing, or we read poems about food and the sensory delights associated with food. Like, there's already an entry point in my classroom. I can be a little bit more bold in bringing some of these environmental concepts. And so hearing what Heather was doing with this sort of elevated show and tell where she asked her [00:05:00] students to describe a meal or food they love, to describe it to a partner in the class, and then they described it to students, um, elsewhere, actually students in Japan, through Padlets and including visuals.

Olivia: Oh, cool. 

Xochitl: I realized that there was a way these stories were quickly circulating, that she wasn't necessarily asking them to stage an expertise. It was really about sharing enthusiasm, and they all loved it. She said students that you rarely heard their voice in class, they wouldn't stop talking about this meal or this food they loved. And then once they were hooked, once they had that buy-in, she asked them a part two. "So let's talk about the environmental toll. Like, what goes into making this food, this dish? You know, what's the footprint of this dish?" 

Olivia: I know you traveled overseas. You spent time in Japan. One of the most interesting things, I've read your book now a couple of times, and I'm using it with many, many middle [00:06:00] and high school teachers. I carry it along. It's a perfect size. Um, one of the things I found fascinating is the way that when you were seeking out to throw something away, there, there weren't, weren't opportunities or there weren't places to throw trash out, and that idea of waste that we experience. What other lessons did you take away and that you carry with you from Japan?

Xochitl: Yeah. Oh, thank you for the opportunity to reminisce about, like, one of my favorite times in my life. Um, but I would say, um, while in Japan, for the first time in my life, I was really proactively practicing great listening skills. And so what I would do at the end of the day is just journal, um, anecdotes, bits of conversation snippets that I heard while the Japanese educators and the American educators were speaking with each other.

And one journal entry I return to pretty frequently is a [00:07:00] conversation I had with a group of Japanese teachers where I asked them, "What makes Japan a leader in sustainability on the world stage? I, I wanna know from you, 'cause I have ideas, but what do you think?" And they said, "You know, ever since the Fukushima nuclear disaster, there's been a huge shift in how Japanese people think about themselves as islanders. Like, all of a sudden we had, like, the clearest notion of how isolated we are in terms of being able to reach out for assistance. Like, and we really understood that, like, we're islanders, and we're kinda cut off in certain ways. And so as a result, we take our emergency preparation in advance of emergencies to this new level, you know, unforeseen before." And it made me think about the role of foresight and actively trying to practice the [00:08:00] skill of learning through foresight, which I had never thought about before. 

Olivia: We have so many facts that tell us that climate change is happening, that it is daunting. Um, why are there not enough facts to help everyone lead to action in the same way Japan does?

Xochitl: What I've come to experience and what I've come to understand from many other people that work in environmental spaces is that truthfully, most people do not need more diagnosis, they want tools and opportunities for connection. Mm-hmm. And so what I've observed in my classroom, um, and I wanna say with, um, it's been surprising sometimes 'cause I'll have a group of very intrinsically motivated students who always wanna solve any problem. When you give them too many statistics about climate change and the climate crisis, you [00:09:00] see in their body language they begin to shut down a little bit. They have met a moment of overwhelm. And this has been really surprising sometimes 'cause in other contexts, these students are the first to jump in and want to try to troubleshoot and problem solve. But there's something about thinking about the climate crisis that's so emotional, uh, that even I think our students that we might think are most game to problem solve do shut down a little bit. And so because of that, I realize it's not necessarily that we need, um, to air more facts or parade more dire statistics, that we need to wrap this data in stories. Uh, because when we give our students opportunities to tell stories, especially stories rooted in communities they care about- 

Olivia: Yeah ... 

Xochitl: you hear their authentic voice. You hear the passion in their tone, and you hear that their call to actions, they have [00:10:00] just that ring of honesty that's unforgettable. 

Olivia: Yeah. So, uh, uh, let's go then to your stances. Uh, I have to let you know, I am leaning on these stances. There's a gorgeous wheel. I have it Post-It on the page. It is on page four of your book. You open right away with it, and you do a really lovely job giving a brief summary of each of the stances, but I am using these stances with social studies teachers as well to have conversation and story tell. One of the social studies teachers I have the privilege of coaching, every unit he puts a just bulleted list of people's names, of events, and then he weaves the story with the students of how these events fit together and push and pull on each other. And I thought, oh my gosh, your stances work so beautifully in every content area. And so I can't leave listeners hanging, Xochitl, [00:11:00] can you illuminate please, what are the six stances, and maybe give an example of each of them? That would be so helpful. 

Xochitl: Absolutely. And thank you for telling me about the work you're doing with these teachers. I love it. Um, so these stances, um, the first one I'll talk about is storytelling for systemic responsiveness, and this actually is very much inspired about the example I just told you about speaking with the Japanese educators. Um- There is a tendency to talk about emergencies as isolated one-off events. And when we really dig into the details of the emergency, we usually can detect a pattern. This isn't a one-off. 

And so going to this idea of like trying to practice foresight, um, I wanna help students anticipate and problem spot and think about like how can we apply a structural lens and scrutinize the infrastructure that exists or doesn't [00:12:00] exist, the institutional support that exists or doesn't exist when we think about how we will handle an emergency when it arises. Um, another storytelling stance is storytelling about root causes. Uh, in environmental conversations, it often can be very difficult to distinguish between root causes and the symptoms of problems. Um, and so I think this is really when storytelling comes in where I try to give students a lot of practice with gathering data points, sifting through information, but also, um, a variety, uh, of, of data points. So thinking about interviews along with the tidy dashboard dataset. 

Olivia: Yeah. 

Xochitl: And, and thinking about how one piece of data isn't the whole story, that thinking about these, these points together gives you a picture that tends to be more comprehensive, uh, allows for some nuance in the storytelling, [00:13:00] and gets to the root causes. Um, another storytelling stance would be storytelling beyond either/or. 

Olivia: Yes. This is huge.

Xochitl: And here we're engaging, engaging in that logical fallacy of thinking it's either this or that in terms of the options available for our decision-making. And it, and it's kind of classic, but we often hear this around election time where, uh, it's kind of stereotypical at this point, but like it's often framed as you can either, you know, protect the environment or grow the economy. And for a lot of voters, it's framed that starkly, black and white. And so I try to help students understand that maybe we can go beyond either/or and think about, well, maybe we could, uh, protect the environment in a way that spurs job creation. So thinking about jobs associated with renewables or the green sector. And so there's ways to get [00:14:00] around just thinking the either/or, but we have to, you know, give them some examples. 

Um, another storytelling stance, uh, so important, storytelling for kinship and reciprocity For a long, long time, uh, particularly Westerners have thought about nature in terms of its instrumental worth to humans. Uh, so thinking about nature as resources that are available for our exploitation, for our profit. And what's really inspired me is to read and listen to many indigenous voices who talk about the need to talk about the reciprocal relationship and the interdependence of all our ecosystems, and the way that humans and the more-than-human world can mutually flourish and exist in, like, a sustainable coexistence. And that's been huge, uh, because students are [00:15:00] aware of that, but they haven't articulated that. And so really giving the chance to grapple with that concept that, yeah, our, our relationship with nature is very exploitative is, is eye-opening. 

Olivia: Yeah, it is. 

Xochitl: Uh, another storytelling stance is storytelling for intergenerational awareness. Um, a lot of us engage in what is called, like, temporal outsourcing, where the way we live compromises the ability of future generations to meet the needs they will have. And so the challenge is, um- and this is why I often read, um, Octavia Butler's Parable of the Sower with my students. The challenge is to think about: how can we rethink the concept of being a future ancestor and what it means to leave an inheritance? So inheritance maybe not in those physical material objects, but in the voting, our participating in [00:16:00] legislation and, and, and policymaking. Um, thinking about those acts as citizen lobbyists, that can be our inheritance. 

Olivia: I have the privilege of studying with the Tulalip tribe, and, um, I've done some work with the Marysville School District years ago, but I've stayed in touch, and they have- do work with children around the Seventh Generation Principle, which is very aligned. They do a whole unit of study with the children, um, around being a cultural guide and thinking of those ancestral implications and the intergenerational, the responsibility that we hold. So I- when I read that stance, I thought, yes, this is- it's so critical for our students to have that, um, gravity to their importance in the future of this work.

Xochitl: Absolutely. And, and to your point, that's a really great opportunity to think about, like, what voices can I now bring into my curriculum to really uplift that [00:17:00] message? Um, and the last storytelling stance would be storytelling for collective mobilization. 

Olivia: Yes. 

Xochitl: And I will tell you, this is very much inspired by what many of us witnessed during the pandemic. Um, people who really, um, banded together in community fashion, uh, really felt like they could navigate this very, very difficult time. And so when I talk about storytelling for co- collective mobilization, it's getting away from this myth of the rugged individual, uh, the self-reliant individual who can pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. Um, that often doesn't work for most people. But also, it's about thinking about social capital, how we invest in relationships, how we invest in partnerships, how we invest in each other so that we don't feel the sense that we're going at this alone. 

Olivia: Yeah. Um, [00:18:00] what I'm excited to do is, I, I thought it was critical that part one focused on these stances because, again, any caregiver, any teacher of content, different content areas can practice these stances. They are so, um, wide-reaching, I would say. I want to end part one with a lightning round, and then part two, I'm actually going to ask you to break down your flow of storytelling with students, and we're going to talk about how we take that flow from the classroom and get it to the world stage. We're going to talk about possible projects, um, and I'm just excited for teachers to be able to hear how to put this work into action based on those stances you just shared. Um, but before I let you go for part one, here is our lightning round. Um, just give your gut responses to these questions. What is a book... Uh, I'll, I'll give the caveat. Once everyone has your book already on their shelf, what is another book that speaks [00:19:00] to climate stewardship that you would recommend?

Xochitl: Right now, I would say The Serviceberry by Robin Wall Kimmerer. It beautifully talks about how we live with an abundance mindset and not a scarcity mindset. So, so many of us feel what is almost like this compulsive need to consume, consume, consume, and she offers an alternative. She says, if you look at examples of things that are happening in certain ecosystems, such as the transformation of the serviceberry as it moves through the ecosystem and endlessly is transformed in a way that provides abundance, um, it's such a beautiful model of how we can engage in the gift economy and gratitude. And my s- a student made a zine actually about how the little free library that exists everywhere is a beautiful example of the gift economy and endlessly exchanging. 

Olivia: Ah, I love that. Uh, what is one word you've found students feel or that could capture how students feel when they first [00:20:00] start on a journey of climate stewardship?

Xochitl: Overwhelmed 

Olivia: Hmm. And that makes sense because thinking of all the data, all the statistics, the doom and gloom, I love how your stance offers the lens of perspective and story, so that, that tracks. Um, what's the most underrated genre for climate storytelling that you've found? 

Xochitl: I love this question. Um, ghost stories.

Olivia: Come on. You have to explain why, please. 

Xochitl: So when you think about many ghost stories, um, and this is a topic I realize every group of learners is an expert on. When you think about ghost stories, often the ghost is angry because of some type of violence that has occurred. Ah. It may be physical, it may be emotional, it may be ancestral, but there's an anger in the ghost character, and they want the harm to be addressed or repaired in some way, and that resonates with [00:21:00] environmental harm, environmental degradation. Um, so our ghost characters, they want this harm addressed. 

Olivia: Ah. That is amazing, and I can- uh, that just alone, people will take and run with from this conversation. Uh, what is the biggest myth you find in environmental education? 

Xochitl: That environmental education rests primarily or solely on scientific concepts.

Olivia: Okay. And last, I'd love for you to finish this sentence. Um, a student becomes a climate steward the moment they... 

Xochitl: Identify assets in their own community. 

Olivia: Hmm. Well said. Um, Xochitl, this has been illuminating, and again, I cannot recommend your book enough. It came out in October of 2025, and I love uplifting resources that I'm using all the time. Um, I had the gift of sitting next to you at NCTE last November and just soaking in all of your brilliance. [00:22:00] So thank you for this part one conversation, and I cannot wait to continue for part two. 

Xochitl: Thank you so much. I loved speaking with you today. 

Olivia: Yeah, absolutely. That is a wrap on part one of my conversation with Xochitl Bentley. We talked about the power of food stories to hook students, lessons from Japan about foresight and island identity, and all of Xochitl's storytelling stances, from systemic responsiveness all the way to collective mobilization. I hope you're already thinking about where these stances can live in your curriculum. You can find Xochitl and everything she's building at xochitlbentley.com, and make sure to pick up a copy of her book, Helping Students Become Climate Stewards. Make sure to come back for part two, where Xochitl moves from describing the stances to the work in classrooms and what real climate stewardship projects look and feel like in a classroom. You do not wanna miss it. See you [00:23:00] Friday.