Especially in times of uncertainties and temporal unpredictability in the context of climate change, one's own resilience and the handling of complex situations play a highlighted role. In order to make this experience tangible for students from different disciplines and to promote appropriate approaches, the IMPULSE project is designing an innovative teaching module with a model character for students on sustainability dilemmas, which makes the diversity of the sustainability discourse tangible.

The conception of the teaching module focuses on the integration of games in the teaching and learning context: Game-based learning has great potential for didactic success in the context of uncertainties, complex factual contexts and individual decision-making situations. It creates an intuitive and error-friendly approach to problem situations and a safe context to deal with otherwise overwhelming topics. Game-based learning can therefore be particularly helpful for dealing with dilemmatic situations in the sustainability discourse.

The aim of the IMPULSE project is to design, implement and subsequently disseminate a model interdisciplinary teaching module for dealing with sustainability dilemmas for students of social and natural science degree programmes.

The approach of game-based learning aims to strengthen students' sustainability awareness and provide them with concrete, applicable methods and tools to solve sustainability problems. The goal is also higher-level, individual reflection. The course enables students to name concrete sustainability dilemmas and, through immersion in the game, to understand and experience how these affect their own actions and their perceived self-efficacy and competence.

The project is divided into four phases: After the planning phase for the identification and selection of the games as well as the didactic design, the module will be carried out in two consecutive semesters with students from different disciplines and reflected on and evaluated. The transfer phase then serves to bundle and pass on the findings of the teaching format.

October 2022 - September 2024

The IMPULSE project is funded by the Deutsche Bundesstiftung Umwelt (DBU) with around 124,000 euros.