Using discovery maps as a free-choice learning process can enhance the effectiveness of environmental education in a botanical garden

Botanical gardens (BGs) are important agencies that enhance human knowledge and attitude towards flora conservation. By following free-choice learning model, we developed a ‘Discovery map’ and distributed the map to visitors at the Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden in Yunnan, China. Visitors, who did and did not receive discovery maps, were evaluated through a questionnaire and behavioural observations. The map-users scored significantly higher on knowledge than non-map-users. Map-users tended to spend more time and pay more attention to plants during tours than the non-map-users. The study provides evidence to indicate using discovery maps as a free-choice learning process can improve visitors’ engagement during the visit and may enhance the effectiveness of environmental education in botanical garden.     

Do pre-visit preparation and post-visit activities improve student outcomes on field trips?

Abstract

Studies of individual environmental education (EE) field trip programs have found that pre-visit preparation and post-visit follow-up activities can enhance desired student outcomes. We examined these relationships across a broad sample of single-day EE field trip programs for adolescent youth (grades 5-8) across the United States. We measured student outcomes, reflecting environmental literacy, 21^st century skills, positive youth development, and student learning, through end-of-visit retrospective student surveys and follow-up surveys with visiting teachers two weeks after the field trip. Pre-visit logistical preparation as well as both pre-visit preparation and post-visit follow-up related to the subject matter were each associated with more positive student outcomes. The study provides further evidence across a large sample of programs that pre-visit preparation and post-visit follow-up can have meaningful impacts on student outcomes for EE field trips. We discuss the implications of the findings and provide examples and guidance for future programming efforts.     

Free-choice learning suited to women’s participation needs in environmental decision-making processes

United Nations mandates recognize the need to promote the full participation of women in environmental decision-making processes on the basis of gender equality. But, there remains a profound lack of effective women’s participation in some sectors of environmental decision-making. Free-choice environmental learning offers an effective educational process for encouraging and developing such participation. This study outlines the shifts in and possibilities for women in environmental decision-making processes in and beyond Western and Northern contexts, and proposes free-choice learning as a pathway to furthering women’s participation.     

Community-level environmental projects as learning tools for planners: a case study of graduate planning students

Despite the potential environmental impact of urban planning, there is little research on Environmental Education (EE) in the context of urban planning curricula. This study follows graduate planning students’ learning experience during group projects assigned as part of a planning course at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology. These participatory projects, characterized as project-based learning and service learning, took place in several communities in Israel. We examined the types of learning impacts the projects engendered by analyzing the reported experiences of the students using parameters from the field of EE. The main goal of this research is to understand the contribution of such practical, hands-on project exercises to the course curriculum for inculcating environmental education themes. Findings indicate that projects helped students acquire and/or improve professional tools. They enhanced motivation to consider environmental concerns in their work and in some cases changed students’ personal environmental behavior.     

Exploring students' learning challenges in environmental education

There is growing recognition of the significance of learning within debates about sustainable development. Within the field of environmental education research, however, there has been insufficient attention given to questions of learners and learning. In the light of this situation, this paper reports findings from two studies (one in England, the other in Sweden) that focused specifically on learners' experiences of and responses to environmental curricula in secondary school and higher education. Three kinds of learning challenges that can be experienced by students on environmental education courses are outlined and discussed. The main purpose of the paper is to highlight the complexity of the learning experience within environmental education and to draw attention to the need for improved research‐based understandings of environmental learning processes.     

Conceptualising Art Education as Environmental Activism in Preservice Teacher Education

This article explores how art and design education can contribute to the imperative of climate change and help societies adapt to living more sustainably. Drawing on methods from arts‐based research and qualitative case study, it reports on an investigation into what can be learned from creating environmental art installations with preservice teachers (those training to be K‐12 teachers), as part of an environmental art education programme in a leading Canadian university. Findings support that preservice teachers experienced behavioural and attitudinal shifts towards sustainability after engaging in the processes of creating environmental art; involvement in the programme also provided opportunities for building community, engaging multiple domains of learning, modelling sustainable art‐making practices and prompting environmental activism. The results of this study inform a developing pedagogy for environmental art education in higher education settings.     

Quantifying the long-term impact of zoological education: a study of learning in a zoo and an aquarium

Abstract

There is increasing evidence that zoos and aquariums do, as intended, educate their visitors. However, even though most zoos offer a wide array of educational experiences, few studies have considered if the duration of an educational experience affects learning or whether learning lasts beyond the immediate visit. The current study used matched-pairs surveys to investigate children’s knowledge, attitude and knowledge of positive behavior during both a five-day zoo camp and six months after an aquarium visit. The participants of the study included children aged 9–12?years some of whom had participated in a purposefully designed educational intervention. First, the impact of a five-day zoo camp experience on children’s learning was investigated. Second, learning retention was investigated six months after a school tour at an aquarium. Results showed that during the camp learning was positively affected by participation in the educational intervention and by previous zoo experience. Girls were more likely than boys to have an increase in learning six months after an aquarium visit. The study demonstrates that learning persists, but that education can be enhanced with longer programs. Thus, zoos can play an increasingly important role in igniting pro-environmental behavior.     

Environmental service learning: outcomes of innovative pedagogy in Baja California Sur,Mexico

This article reports on a longitudinal study of a two‐semester middle school environmental learning course that departs from traditional Mexican expository pedagogies through the incorporation of experiential and service learning approaches. In the short term, course participants acquired a heightened awareness of environmental issues, augmented their environmental perceptions and consciousness, and complemented all this with environmentally responsible behaviours. Two years after completing the experiential course, students retained pro‐environmental attitudes and behaviours and unexpectedly exhibited an expanded role in intergenerational learning. The research adds to the handful of studies in this cross‐disciplinary field through qualitative methodologies that refine our understanding of the outcomes of experiential environmental learning.     

Learning about sustainability and gender through Farmer Field Schools in the Taita Hills,Kenya

This research uses transformative learning theory to explore how Farmers Field Schools (FFS) of the Taita Hills, Kenya have contributed to environmental sustainability, with a particular focus on gendered learning. Both genders experienced transformations in their meaning schemes related to farming (e.g., men and women switched their traditional roles in tillage and planting). A significant change in meaning perspective occurred among men who overcame personal biases and a cultural practice of land inheritance for males to now include their daughters. More research is needed to explore how all participants (farmers, extension agents, scientists) could enhance sustainability efforts and gender equality through agricultural participatory education projects such as FFS.     

Learning about the types of plastic wastes: effectiveness of inquiry learning strategies

This study aims to examine the impacts of the inquiry learning strategies employed in a ‘Plastic Education Project’ on primary students' knowledge, beliefs and intended behaviour in Hong Kong. Student questionnaires and a test on plastic types were adopted for data collection. Results reveal that the inquiry learning strategies significantly improved students' knowledge of the types of plastic wastes and their corresponding beliefs. However, the strategies seemed not to change students' intended behaviour regarding plastic waste classification and management. The implications of the study for further learning and teaching in environmental education are discussed.     

Learning outdoors or with a computer: the contribution of the learning setting to learning and to environmental perceptions

ABSTRACT

Background: Outdoor learning and computer-based learning are two different alternatives to in-class conventional teacher-centered learning.

Purpose: This study compares the outdoor learning setting with computer-based learning in class. It examines the influence of the two different learning settings on academic achievements, the learning experience, and pro-environmental perceptions.

Sample: A total of 90 elementary school students (third and fourth-grade classes) participated in the study.

Design and methods: The academic knowledge of the study participants was tested through identical exams for both learning settings. In addition, in each group the students’ perceptions were examined by means of a questionnaire about environmental values and the learning experience.

Results: The study demonstrates that academic achievements in the two settings were similar, but the students expressed more enthusiasm about the outdoor learning experience than about in-class learning. In addition, the outdoor learning setting contributed more to promoting positive environmental perceptions even though students did not learn directly about environmental issues and sustainability.

Conclusions: These findings suggest that learning in the natural environment is valuable: Alongside the fostering of computerized learning, it is also important to promoteoutdoor learning settings and integrate both settings by implementing mobile technologies in the outdoor teaching.     

Sustainability education in a botanical garden promotes environmental knowledge,attitudes and willingness to act

Abstract

Creating behavior change to mobilize transitions toward sustainability is a significant challenge of our time. Inspired by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization’s Farmer Field School, we developed a novel community-based education program to engage people in local sustainability topics. In the Sustainable Communities Field School (Field School) program, advertised as team building tours, participants from local organizations are guided by instructors through University of British Columbia Botanical Garden, while receiving verbal and experiential education on topics of food systems and choices, biodiversity conservation, water conservation, and waste reduction. We found that after the Field School program, participants were significantly more knowledgeable about environmental issues, more connected to nature, showed greater intentions and willingness to engage in sustainability actions compared to garden visitors from the general public who did not go through the program. The results suggest that interactive sustainability education in a botanical garden setting can be a useful education model to mobilize public engagement on sustainability.     

Environmental and sustainability education policy research: a systematic review of methodological and thematic trends

This paper reports on a systematic literature review of policy research in the area of environmental and sustainability education. We analyzed 215 research articles, spanning four decades and representing 71 countries, and which engaged a range of methodologies. Our analysis combines quantification of geographic and methodological trends with qualitative analysis of content-based themes. Significant findings included temporal spikes in published policy research occurring in the mid-1970s, late 1990s, and after 2005, as well as geographic under-representation of Africa, South and Central America, Eastern Europe, and North and West Asia. The majority of articles reviewed were non-empirical; empirical articles overwhelmingly focused on teaching and learning directives, rather than exploring the complexity of policy development or enactment. We conclude our analysis by describing key research gaps as highlighted by the review and propose directions for moving forward policy research in environmental and sustainability education. In particular, we suggest greater research attention to critical policy theory and methodology, issues of intersectionality, and climate change education policy research. By outlining in greater detail the policy research that has been undertaken to date, the review provides a platform for a broadened diversity of policy studies in environmental and sustainability education.     

Integrating environmental sustainability into universities

Universities play a fundamental role in addressing global environmental challenges as their education, research and community involvement can produce long-lasting environmental effects and societal change. By demonstrating best practice in their operations, research and teaching, universities have both multiple and multiplier effects on society. For universities to comprehensively address sustainability, a ‘learning for sustainability’ approach needs to be embedded across every aspect of institutional operations in a synergistic way. Using semi-structured interviews, this research explored the factors that influence the integration of sustainability into the operations, teaching and research activities of universities in Australia and England. The research found that individuals, committed to the goal of a more sustainable world, play a vital role in the success of integrating environmental sustainability into universities. The factors critical to enabling universities to undertake the transformational changes necessary to embed environmental sustainability into all university areas included: a strong policy environment, resourcing of strategies, and encouragement of leaders and environmental sustainability advocates. Educating and building the awareness of university staff of the importance of environmental sustainability to future generations was key to a successful strategy.     

Sustainability as a cross-curricular priority in the Australian Curriculum: a Tasmanian investigation

In this paper, we report on an investigation into sustainability education in schools in the Australian state of Tasmania following the implementation of the Australian Curriculum. Sustainability is one of three cross-curriculum priorities in the new national curriculum and is the focus of this research (sustainability cross-curriculum priority (CCP)). Principals and Curriculum Leaders (PCLs) from all schools in Tasmania were invited to complete a survey that asked them about their understanding of various aspects of sustainability and how the sustainability CCP was integrated across learning areas. Sixty-eight PCLs (24%) responded to the survey. They reported generally good understandings of sustainability and education for sustainability, but lesser understandings of the sustainability CCP and the nine organising ideas. Respondents’ understandings of sustainability were dominated by an environmental focus. The PCLs’ responses in relation to sustainability implementation across learning areas gave insights into ways that the sustainability CCP can serve as a pivot for cross-curricular teaching and learning, which is strongly advocated for achieving transformative sustainability education. We conclude this paper with a discussion of how the sustainability CCP is an important asset in the necessary reorientation of the Australian formal education system for a more sustainable future. We note the importance of professional support so that educators may better understand sustainability and its complexity as a cross-curricular priority and envision ways in which the sustainability CCP can be realised within education.     

Using blended learning and out-of-school visits: pedagogies for effective science teaching in the twenty-first century

Background: Recent research and curriculum reforms have indicated the need for diversifying teaching approaches by drawing upon student interest and engagement in ways which makes learning science meaningful. Purpose: This study examines the integration of informal/free choice learning which occurred during learning experiences outside school (LEOS) with classroom learning using digital technologies. Specifically, the digital technologies comprised a learning management system (LMS), Moodle, which fits well with students’ lived experiences and their digital world. Design and Method: This study examines three out-of-school visits to Informal Science Institutes (ISI) using a digitally integrated fieldtrip inventory (DIFI) Model. Research questions were analysed using thematic approach emerging along with semi-structured interviews, before, during and after the visit, and assessing students’ learning experiences. Data comprised photographs, field notes, and unobtrusive observations of the classroom, wiki postings, student work books and teacher planning diaries. Results: We argue, that pre- and post-visit planning using the DIFI Model is more likely to engage learners, and the use of a digital learning platform was even more likely to encourage collaborative learning. The conclusion can also be drawn that students’ level of motivation for collaborative learning positively correlates with their improvement in academic achievement.     

Recycling,crafting and learning – an empirical analysis of how students learn with garments and textile refuse in a school remake project

Creative remake assignments using garments and textile refuse are common educational projects to promote environmental and sustainability actions. However, very little empirical research has been carried out on the learning processes of remake projects. In this article, the aim is to examine how students learn with garments and textile refuse when engaging in a remake project. The exploration is conducted in a Swedish crafts class, educational sloyd, as a case. Practical epistemological analysis and the concept of transactant are used to analyse and be attentive to the learning process. The findings show how students transact with the idea of a product, the material’s capabilities and the remake techniques. Further, the transactants show what participates and makes the learning process turn in specific directions, which is further discussed in the paper. Based on this empirical research, we may increase our understandings of how the learning processes is made in the remake project, and that knowledge can help us understand, and thus improve the quality of remake projects in relation to the environmental and sustainability aims.     

Science learning in a leisure setting

Most people visit a science center in order to satisfy specific leisure‐related needs; needs which may or may not actually include science learning. Falk proposed that an individual's identity‐related motivations provide a useful lens through which to understand adult free‐choice science learning in leisure settings. Over a 3‐year period the authors collected in‐depth data on a random sample of visitors to a large recently opened, hands‐on, interactive science center; collecting information on why people visited, what they did within the science center, what they knew about the subject presented upon entering and exiting, and what each individual's long‐term self‐perceptions of their own learning was. Presented is a qualitative analysis of visitor interviews collected roughly 2 years after the initial visit. Although there was evidence for a range of science learning outcomes, outcomes did appear to be strongly influenced by visitor's entering identity‐related motivations. However, the data also suggested that not only were the motivational goals of a science center visit important in determining outcomes, so too were the criteria by which visitors judged satisfaction of those goals; in particular whether goal satisfaction required external or merely internal validation. The implications for future informal science education research and practice are discussed. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 47:194–212, 2010     

Science education for sustainability, epistemological reflections and educational practices: from natural sciences to trans-disciplinarity

In this three-part article we seek to establish connections between the emerging framework of sustainability science and the methodological basis of research and practice in science education in order to bring forth knowledge and competences for sustainability. The first and second parts deal with the implications of taking a sustainability view in relation to knowledge processes. The complexity, uncertainty and urgency of global environmental problems challenge the foundations of reductionist Western science. Within such debate, the proposal of sustainability science advocates for inter-disciplinary and inter-paradigmatic collaboration and it includes the requirements of post-normal science proposing a respectful dialogue between experts and non-experts in the construction of new scientific knowledge. Such a change of epistemology is rooted into participation, deliberation and the gathering of extended-facts where cultural framings and values are the hard components in the face of soft facts. A reflection on language and communication processes is thus the focus of knowledge practices and educational approaches aimed at sustainability. Language contains the roots of conceptual thinking (including scientific knowledge) and each culture and society are defined and limited by the language that is used to describe and act upon the world. Within a scenario of sustainability, a discussion of scientific language is in order to retrace the connections between language and culture, and to promote a holistic view based on pluralism and dialogue. Drawing on the linguistic reflection, the third part gives examples of teaching and learning situations involving prospective science teachers in action-research contexts: these activities are set out to promote linguistic integration and to introduce reflexive process into science learning. Discussion will focus on the methodological features of a learning process that is akin to a communal and emancipatory research process within a sustainability scenario.     

贵州高校大学生环境意识现状调查分析

增强大学生环境意识对可持续发展有重大意义。通过随机抽样法,抽取了贵州四所高校的427名学生,从环境知识、环境观念和环保行为三个维度调查学生的环境意识。结果表明:环境知识、环境观念与环保行为呈显著正相关;大学生的环境知识及环境观念有待增强;大学生环保意识淡薄受社会负面影响大。高校应开展环境价值教育、环境知识及法制教育;采取渗透式教育增强学生环境意识,各方面努力引导大学生积极参与环保。