Implementing Research-Based Learning Integrated with STEM to Foster Students’ Climate Change Literacy through Creative Packaging Prototyping

Abstract

Climate change education requires classroom experiences that move beyond the transmission of environmental facts and engage students in inquiry, design, data interpretation, and action-oriented problem solving. This study reports the implementation of Research-Based Learning integrated with STEM to foster secondary students’ climate change literacy through creative packaging prototyping. The instructional design was developed from a broader learning-tool development project and implemented using recycled cardboard, Teachable Machine, and robotics to construct a prototype of an intelligent packaging production track for classifying limes as a local agricultural product. The study employed a developmental approach followed by classroom implementation using a nonequivalent control group design. Learning activities were organised around problem identification, information gathering, technological exploration, engineering design, mathematical analysis, and reporting. The findings indicate that the RBL–STEM design successfully embedded science, technology, engineering, and mathematics within a contextual sustainability task and created meaningful opportunities for students to examine climate-related issues, reuse inorganic waste, discuss carbon footprint reduction, analyse classification data, and communicate findings collaboratively. The study also developed a multidimensional climate change literacy framework encompassing conceptual understanding, causes, impacts, inquiry, communication, and solutions. Overall, the article suggests that research-based STEM learning offers a feasible and pedagogically meaningful pathway for strengthening climate change literacy through interdisciplinary and prototype-based classroom practice.