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Background: Despite the increasing square footage of green buildings worldwide, green building expertise remains largely in the domain of building industry professionals. However, the performance of and advocacy for green buildings would benefit from a green building literate general public. Green building education is an expanding frontier for STEM education and can create opportunities to integrate science and environmental literacies into the study of everyday environments. Few resources exist, however, to help STEM educators incorporate green building themes into the science classroom. The work here developed educational tools for connecting green buildings and science education through a multi-step process. An interdisciplinary literature review yielded a series of frameworks that were improved through two focus groups with science and environmental educators and built environment professionals. Results: The result of this process is a toolbox of conceptual frameworks for educators interested in using a systemsbased approach to teach about green buildings as sites for complex interactions between human activity and Earth systems. The work here first leverages the broad definition of environmental literacy (knowledge, skills, affect, and behavior) to advance a working definition for "green building literacy." Next, major domains of green building knowledge are developed and linked to the Next Generation Science Standards. Conclusions: Green building literacy has been an ill-defined term and green building themes have not been rigorously connected to science and environmental education. The work here provides a foundation for promoting green building literacy through K-12 STEM education. The educational tools developed through this process can be used as a starting point for lesson planning to catalyze green building education in a variety of formal and informal settings.

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Amid increasing interests in social metrics within green buildings, this work focuses on buildings designed to enhance environmental education, here called “Teaching Green Buildings” (TGBs). This study examines one school building at three points in time before and after the move into a new construction TGB. Middle school students here and at a local, comparison Non-Green School ( N = 264) took a survey measuring outcomes of green building knowledge (GBK) and environmentally responsible behaviors (ERBs). Regression results showed that GBK is significantly higher for students in the Green School compared with the Non-Green School, but is not increasing over time for students at the Green School. No differences were detected in ERBs across schools or time, and it was found that school practices, more than the green building itself, were pivotal in student choices to conduct ERBs at school.