Stand Up, Stand Up and Be Counted: Undermining Myths of Environmental Education

1997 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 21-26 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Fien

AbstractThis paper explores some of the ideas that underlie different conceptions of sustainable development. It suggests the notion of ‘sustainable living’ may provide direction for the role of environmental education in the transition towards a sustainable society. Aspects of the emerging concept of ‘education for sustainable living’ are used to analyse some widely-held assumptions about environmental education practice. In doing so the paper seeks to contribute to the process of identifying a vision and practice appropriate to environmental education for a new millennium.

2019 ◽  
Vol 15 (4) ◽  
pp. 342-357
Author(s):  
Barbara Maria Sageidet

This paper elucidates the role of the sciences within education for sustainable development as it is reflected on the World Environmental Education Congress (WEEC), a leading international conference since 2003. A historical perspective, and observations, conversations, interviews and a look at the presentations of the WEEC 2015 and WEEC 2017, this study reveals an underrepresentation of science education, while a dominance was registered on WEEC conferences for ten years ago. Both the WEEC 2015 and WEEC 2017 provided plenty of information about science related realities, but little about how to get children and the youth to understand them. Only few of the papers and posters were addressed to children’s and pupils learning related to physics or biogeochemical basic understanding.   The understanding of natural interrelationships and concepts is essential for children and the youth for to become informed decision-makers and active participants in a sustainable society.  


2015 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 30-41 ◽  
Author(s):  
Annette Gough ◽  
Noel Gough

AbstractThis article explores the changing ways ‘environment’ has been represented in the discourses of environmental education and education for sustainable development (ESD) in United Nations (and related) publications since the 1970s. It draws on the writings of Jean-Luc Nancy and discusses the increasingly dominant view of the environment as a ‘natural resource base for economic and social development’ (United Nations, 2002, p. 2) and how this instrumentalisation of nature is produced by discourses and ‘ecotechnologies’ that ‘identify and define the natural realm in our relationship with it’ (Boetzkes, 2010, p. 29). This denaturation of nature is reflected in the priorities for sustainable development discussed at Rio+20 and proposed successor UNESCO projects. The article argues for the need to reassert the intrinsic value of ‘environment’ in education discourses and discusses strategies for so doing. The article is intended as a wake-up call to the changing context of the ‘environment’ in ESD discourses. In particular, we need to respond to the recent UNESCO (2013a, 2013b) direction of global citizenship education as the successor to the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development 2005–2014 that continues to reinforce an instrumentalist view of the environment as part of contributing to ‘a more just, peaceful, tolerant, inclusive, secure and sustainable world’ (UNESCO, 2013a, p. 3).


2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 122-131
Author(s):  
Lavrentyeva Nina G. ◽  

A teacher is a key figure in ecological education of preschoolers for their safe and happy future life. Intensiveness of preschooler’s development, dependence of his life from grown-ups, direction of development to future life requires to raise social ecological responsibility of teachers before the future generation. The purpose of the article is to show the specific character of teachers’ training as the organizational and pedagogical condition of ecological education of preschoolers in the conditions of natural and sociocultural environment of a kindergarten. Analysis of theoretical sources and teaching practice allows you to identify the most valuable content lines and technological mechanisms of professional training of preschool students and practicing teachers for environmental education of children. The research methods are the analysis of the theory and practice of environmental education of preschoolers, professional training of teachers, generalization, and correlation of the analysis results with the goals of sustainable development, comparison, systematization, questioning of teachers of preschool educational organizations. Achieving the goals of sustainable development of society makes it necessary to focus the content and technologies of organizing environmental education for children on the knowledge of the consistency of the structure and functioning of the natural and sociocultural world, the allocation of ecosystems of different levels in it. In this case, the semantic needs of the future will be reflected in the pedagogical design of the present. Determination of the system-forming role of environmental education will optimize professional training and comprehend the unity of natural science and humanitarian knowledge. Strengthening the personal orientation of education by taking into account the level of training, individual interests, preferred styles of information processing, increases cognitive activity and creative self-realization of each student. The use of project activities and interactive forms and methods of designing environmental education for children create conditions for improving the professional qualities of teachers, increase the value of training. Thus, the directed specificity of the content of vocational education of kindergarten teachers from the perspective of the future increases their social and environmental responsibility to future generations and the effectiveness of the results of environmental education of preschoolers in the process of professional implementation. Keywords: professional training, ecological education of preschoolers, natural and sociocultural environment, system-forming role of ecological education, social ecological responsibility


Author(s):  
Yuto Kitamura

This chapter provides an overview of how “Education for Sustainable Development” (ESD) is being promoted in Cambodia today through historical, social, and cultural contexts as part of the implementation of the goals of “Education for All (EFA),” from three perspectives: (1) acquisition/improvement of life skills; (2) enhancing environmental education; and (3) promotion of peace education and human rights education. It is worth noting here that although the educational activities conducted in Cambodia are not necessarily known as ESD, they certainly embody the concept of it. The chapter emphasizes that the positioning of EFA and ESD as essential lifelong learning is important to achieve a sustainable society.1


2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (4) ◽  
pp. 6-15
Author(s):  
Dzyatkovskaya Elena N. ◽  

The article describes the changes taking place in culture and education of the 21st century in connection with the civilization search for ways of sustainable development. The role of environmental culture as a platform for the formation of a sustainable development culture is considered. The problem of developing methodological approaches to ensuring the continuity of the formation in general education of the foundations of a culture of sustainable development based on ecological culture is actualized. The conclusion is made about the new mission of environmental education as education for sustainable development, which forms the prerequisites for the development of the foundations of sustainable development culture. A comparative characteristic of environmental culture in its classical understanding as a result of natural-scientific ecological education of schoolchildren, and ecological culture for sustainable development, as the integration of cultural results of all general education, is given. The essence of culturological, cultural-creative, value-worldview, integrative, semiotic-hermeneutic and institutional approaches to ensuring the continuity of the formation of ecological culture and culture of sustainable development is revealed. The development degree of these approaches and the pedagogical means of their implementation in the general educational process are analyzed. It is concluded that the application of the identified methodological approaches requires a rethinking of the theory of constructing the environmental education content, its sources, criteria and indicators of its results, primarily personal


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