Showing papers on "Environmental education published in 1989"

What Research Says to the Educator: Part One: Environmental Education and the Affective Domain

Abstract: (1989). What Research Says to the Educator: Part One: Environmental Education and the Affective Domain. The Journal of Environmental Education: Vol. 20, No. 3, pp. 3-9.

Lifelong education for adults : an international handbook

Abstract: Hardbound. Lifelong Education for Adults: An International Handbook is the first work intended to offer international, encyclopedic coverage of research and studies in the whole field of adult education. With 127 articles written by international specialists, this work will be an invaluable reference source for all those who are engaged in educational activities for adults, either as full-time planners/administrators of educational programmes, or part-time adult educators. There are, for example, articles on education for work and for living, on population education, peace and environmental education, and on learning for personal development and role fulfilment. Conceptual frameworks, practical issues relating to instructional methods, counselling, curriculum and evaluation, and developments in distance learning, group learning, and adult learning are some of the topics discussed. Systems of adult education worldwide, as well as adult educati

The Effects of Issue Investigation and Action Training on Environmental Behavior in Seventh Grade Students

Abstract: This study reports the instructional effects of a formal environmental education methodology, issue investigation and action training (IIAT) on middle school students. Can issue investigation and action training improve responsible environmental behavior of middle school students? Can variables identified as critical contributors to responsible adult environmental behavior be enhanced in middle school students as a function of issue investigation and action training? If middle school students demonstrate increased environmental behavior as a result of issue investigation and action training, will there be a parallel increase in those variables contributing to responsible environmental behavior? These questions are the focus of the discussion that follows.

The Child in the Physical Environment: The Development of Spatial Knowledge and Cognition

Abstract: Part 1 Processes of environmental cognition: environmental cognition - a conceptual and methodological review routes, directions and action planning. Part 2 The development of environmental cognition - from body-image onwards: the location of objects and self in space the child in geographical space investigating the child's cognitive map the role of direct experience of the environment in the development of cognitive representations maps and their use - symbolic sources of information about the environment the child's image of distant places - media, maps and formal geography expand the area known. Part 3 Applications of environmental cognition research: the child with special needs and the physical environment designing for the child's needs geographical and environmental education.

More Infusion Confusion: A Look at Environmental Education Curriculum Materials

Abstract: It is widely accepted among professionals that environmental education should be infused throughout the school curriculum at every grade level. Yet a great deal of evidence seems to indicate that this integration is not taking place. This paper suggests that the failure to infuse environmental education equally throughout the curriculum may be related, in part, to the types of instructional materials available.

Four Steps to Evaluating Environmental Education Learning Experiences

Abstract: The process of evaluating the effects of environmental education learning experiences on program participants involves knowing what evaluation is, its importance, obstacles to evaluation, and the role of educators and participants as evaluators. Program evaluation may be organized around four steps: step one—deciding what to evaluate, developing objectives, and allowing for intuitive and unanticipated outcomes; step two—determining the evaluation design and developing instruments; step three—collecting, analyzing, and interpreting data; and step four—reporting results and improving the educational program.

Social critique or social control: Some problems for evaluation in environmental education

Abstract: Environmental education is often thought of as the branch of science education whose field of inquiry encompasses those necessarily value-laden issues of human intervention in the natural world While this perception would be contested by those who see the origins of environmental education lying in the sociopolitical arena of community concerns about exploitation of the environment, it is true to say that environmental education and science education are commonly associated in ways that other disciplines are not, and thus it is perhaps to be expected that the dominant paradigm of evaluation in environmental education should be applied science in character This article raises the issue of the appropriateness of applied science approaches to evaluation in environmental education The article begins with a critique of applied science approaches to evaluation, drawing arguments from the broader field of educational evaluation The relationship between characteristics of applied science approaches to evaluation on the one hand and the special characteristics of environmental education on the other is then explored, and the article concludes with an argument for a deliberative choice of research paradigm in environmental education

A Technique for Analyzing Environmental Issues.

Abstract: Teaching students to deal with issues appears to be a major component of environmental education. However, complex environmental issues are often confusing for students. The issue analysis technique presented here allows learners to organize information about an issue in a sound conceptual framework.

Beyond environmental education: The need for ecological awareness

Abstract: ‘Environmental education’ is frequently both inadequate and inefficient, as too little attention is paid to the outside influences of its cultural, scientific and political context. Since ecological problems cannot be solved only by scientific measurement, administrative action and technological compensation, ‘ecological education’ is necessary to deal with the polluter in his ecological environment. It is inevitable that this type of education will combine natural and human dimensions, that is, that it will make people aware of interrelationships between biotopes and sociotopes, so that conflicts of goals between human and natural environmental demands become apparent and an evaluation of risks becomes possible. The discussion of these problems starts with references to these demands and to the interrelationship of environmental policy, public environmental awareness and environmental education. Against this background a preventive ecological education is postulated and compared with the existing curricula and teaching practice. From the differences didactic conclusions are drawn as to how the predispositions of the public, institutions and young people can be integrated into the establishment of the educational concept of ecological education. There is also a discussion of how the norms of such education will change with the actual interaction of the human and natural dimensions.

Twelfth Grade Student Knowledge and Attitudes toward the Environment in the Dominican Republic: An Assessment

Abstract: The main purpose of this study was to assess the environmental knowledge and attitudes of Dominican students in the twelfth year of school who had received no exposure to environmental education. For this purpose, a stratified random sample of twenty-three secondary schools was selected. A sixty-item test was given to approximately thirty students randomly selected from each of the schools. The students' score averages in the two sections (knowledge and attitudes) were 51 percent and 55 percent, respectively. Of the variables included, only sex of the students produced a significant difference, with males outscoring females. Poverty and deforestation were ranked as the most critical environmental problems.

Student Knowledge of Scientific and Natural Resource Concepts Concerning Acidic Deposition

Abstract: This study assessed the level of scientific and natural resource knowledge that fourth-, eighth-, and eleventh-grade students in Maine possess concerning acidic deposition. A representative sample of public school students (N = 175) was interviewed on twelve concept principles considered critical to a full understanding of the acidic deposition problem. These included geological, meteorological, ecological, political, and economic concepts. Student knowledge was rated for each concept principle on a scale of complete, high partial, low partial, or no understanding. Common misconceptions were also noted. Generalized correct concept statements of current student knowledge are reported, as well as generalized missing concepts. Our conclusions have implications for teaching about acidic deposition and the design of environmental education curriculum materials based upon student knowledge. This information can help teachers better instruct students about current environmental problems and thus help le...

Planning National Parks for Ecodevelopment. Methods and Cases from Latin America. Volumes I and II. Reprint R073.

Abstract: ion has several practical implications. The risk of taking the wrong equipment to the field is reduced. The team can become knowledgeable of the area before arrival and thereby design an inventory which seeks the answers to the key questions. And, the team will rot easily be mislead by the common error of generalizing their limited knowledge from very unique experiences. For example, the 1973 planning team carried out their work during the typically cool, foggy ("garua") weather associated with the Humbolt Current. A follow-up mission made up of many of the same officers returned to the are in 1975 to further specify planning decisions. This second mission took place during the unpredictable Nino Current period which brings hot, relatively rainy (tropical) weather. One can well imagine the magnitude of planning errors had the only planning team visit to an unknown area been made during the unusual period such as the Nino Current in the Galapagos. Additional practical implications of abstraction include the freedom from the basic tasks of navigation, exploration and survival. Higher planning efficiency (e.g., more hours of planning activity per unit of time in the field) was potentially available. On the contrary, in the case of the Canaima exercise in 1962, approximately one-half of the daylight hours of each day in the field were spent precisely on navigation, exploration along spur lines, and gathering of firewood, pitching tents on bare rock outcrops or searching for caves to serve as campsites. Often, camps would be established early in the day to avoid risking the lack of suitable site or firewood by nightfall. This point is important to stress: Risk and uncertainty are at play not only in the planning of the national ark, but also in the planning, organization and management of the planning teem itself! In the Galapagos Islands there was already an established park organization functionally linked with a research station. The Darwin Station's research vessel the Beagle III and several smaller boats provided for the inter-island transport network. Rangers were already patrolling, controlling introduced feral animals, and managing turism use in the Park. Maps of the Park were available. Literature was available on many aspects of the complex ecosystems of the Park. The little-studied marine environment was being investigated. There were offices, housing facilities and services, and research laboratories and library. A radio connected the Park Headquarters with the central National Parks Office in Quito at the Forest Service. The team initiated its field work from the Park Headquarters and the Research Station on Santa Cruz Island. Aboard the research vessel the Beagle III the team traveled and worked during 21 days inspecting key sites throughout the archipelago and preparing a rough draft plan for the Park. Later, the team finalized a draft of the Park plan at Headquarters during 14 days. The draft was then circulated widely in Ecuador and around the world. Ten months later, after the comments and corrections had been incorporated during a further 14 days of work, a second draft was submitted to the Director of the Ecuadorian Forest Service, who studied and approved the document, and submitted it to the Minister of Agriculture and Livestock. The final draft was published and carried the approval and mandate of the Ministry. The method for the inventory car be synthesized briefly as follows: 1) Become acquainted with the area (in abstraction) by studying existing maps, literature, aerial photographs and satellite imagery, and by communicating with knowledgeable individuals. 2) Sub-divide the area into TYPE units in terms of particular problems, uses, and opportunities. For example, in the case of Galapagos, a) recreation and tourism require evaluation and decision since they already comprise a large activity and utilize specific sites on several islands; b) tourism is transported and catered by ocean-going vessels rather than by fixed-base operations (hotels and restaurants) and warrants inspection and decision; c) science and research is a very important and well known service on the Park, its compatibility with tourism and with other objectives of the Park needs analysis and decision; d) marine resources are already being utilized for skindiving and fishing by tourism and for local requirements, yet the marine resources are little studied and decision must be made concerning future use of marine areas and research needs; e) the four villages and their expansion and agriculture zones need review and decision to ensure adequate harmony in development and management of the overall island ecosystem; f) and finally, the Planning Board wishes to ensure that adequate consideration is given to land-use alternatives for the Islands' terrestrial and marine habitats (cattle, fishing, etc.). 3) Analyze and evaluate those sites where high priority problems, uses and opportunities require decision. The team will not be able to physically visit all of the sites in the vast park area. By choosing key problems or sites for direct analysis and evaluation, the TYPE system will allow the team to generalize management and development decisions to other areas which are not be to visited by the entire team. 4) In the company of the park officers and scientists, cruise along shorelines and into inlets, and climb mountains and volcanoes to visually note lower priority areas. Extrapolate the information and criteria which has been established for the high priority sites which were visited by the entire team to those sites which due to lower priority, will not be visited by the team. 5) Reformulate the gathered information and criteria into guidelines for supporting management decisions. The guidelines should specifically relate to the problems, uses and opportunities which were analyzed and evaluated during the inventory phase. Several comparisons and contrasts can be drawn between the Canaima and the Galapagos exercises. First, in Canaima, the team followed a BASE LINE TRANSECT in a context of primary exploration. (Only one guide had been even partially across the top of the Auyan-tepui mountain and that only one time, years before). The line was extended and realigned as terrain and criteria evolved along the route. Spur lines were run daily as curiosity and new ideas developed. The terrain itself fed the imagination of the team members. In contrast, the Galapagos team went directly to specific pre-chosen sites which were well known by the park officers and scientists. Second, in Canaima, it was the route which was chosen, the sites were met by search and by chance. In Galapagos, the sites were chosen, and the route was selected simply to utilize the most economical path to link the sites. Both methods, however, were subjected to the planners' curiosity and unrelenting questions, which typically led to deviations in the routing and the scheduling. And third, the two methods differ in the role of the scientist. In the unknown area, the scientist will be busy collecting and taking notes. He will be working under ignorance similar to other expedition members. Only some time later, when the data are assembled and analyzed, will the scientist be able to offer specific explanations and guidelines. In contrast, the scientists on the Galapagos planning team were immediately in a position to support planning decisions with facts and principles, to support scientific problems and solutions, and to challenge the ideas of others in a constructive manner. Appendix III-B. Development sequence for Santa Rosa national park, Costa Rica

Environmental Education, Children, and Animals

Abstract: This article discusses the results of a research project concerning environmental education and the relationship between children and animals. Five kindergartens were visited and 26 open interviews were conducted with children between the ages of 6 and 12. The leading question in this study was, How do children experience animals, and how do they perceive nature? The next question was, How does a relationship develop between a child and an animal, and how is this relationship useful in environmental education?A young child's concept of life and death is very restricted. If something does not move, it is dead; if something does move, it is alive. Thus, for young children, nature is not living. Only at roughly the age of 10 does a child gain the insight that trees and plants are really living nature. Most of the time, however, children have a much greater interest in living animals than in trees and plants. The animals in this project also were used deliberately in a broader environmental context.Th...

Outdoor education: Environmental education reinvented, or environmental education reconceived?

Abstract: In most Victorian schools outdoor education has meant the weekend bushwalk or the end of year camp. It has been extra-curricula. But that is changing. Outdoor education appears poised to achieve subject status is Victoria. It is included in official curriculum developments and is served by recognised specialist tertiary courses. Outdoor education has been distinguished from physical education by its focus on environmental education, and a converse argument probably applies. But is the environmental education which occurs in outdoor education distinguished by anything other than an association with adventure activities? After all, field trips are not a new idea. This paper argues that the distinctiveness of outdoor education as a form of environmental education is derived from its physical and conceptual isolation from schooling. Conceptual isolation provides the opportunity to construct powerfully affective forms of de-schooled environmental education. The ways in which an outdoor education context can provide different situational constraints from those existing in schools or other institutions are outlined. An action research project is used to exemplify ways in which teachers might reconceive education within those new constraints. The paper concludes that outdoor education can allow powerful forms of environmental education to develop, but that a technocratic rationalisation of the field associated with its increasing institutionalisatlon threatens to negate that potential.

Human Ecology: A Suprastructure for Global Education

Abstract: Descriptions of global education have tended to be either fragmented or nebulous. Consequently, the educator is left with little tangible basis for developing an instructional program. This paper advocates using fundamental ideas from the fields of geography and environmental sociology, which collectively contribute to the formation of “human ecology,” as a suprastructure for the analysis of current issues that are critical to global well-being. Related concepts were arranged on a flow chart, and subservient issues were factored out, resulting in a cohesive structure that reveals interrelated human/environmental factors that interface the social, physical, and natural sciences.