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Episode #4
Teaching Sustainability
Episode Air Date: April 16th, 2020
Transcript:
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<<Music: April Showers- ProleteR>>
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Episode #4
Teaching Sustainability
Music: April showers- ProleteR
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[00:00:20.600] - DS
: Hi! I’m your host Devon and welcome to WildWay, a podcast for those who are sustainable, those who want to be and those who have a hankering for learning. On todays episode conservation starts with education! We are going to talk about the pursuit of sustainable development and climate action in our elementary schools and to walk us through this a long time Vancouverite teacher Ms. Simpson will join us.
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Let me ask you this: is environmental education important for elementary kids? Ok, now where does it rank with math? What about reading and writing? How much time should a grade two spend studying the environment?
In the psychological literature it is widely agreed upon that development in early childhood plays a large part of the framework that creates who we become. Our cognitive skills, our achievements, and our psychological wellbeing are all directly related to our upbringing. Nature connectedness can be defined as a “sense of oneness with the natural world” that constructs pro-environmental attitudes and behaviours that is not only a state but a personality trait that is changeable through experience (Barrable, 2019). Many studies have found that nature connectedness is increased through positive experiences within nature and learning outdoors. (Barrable, 2019; Clayton & Myers, 2015; Tekbiyik & Çelik, 2019).
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Really, education is the way to solve all our worlds’ problems. Our children are the future and it is our duty to prepare them and offer them as much as we can.Susan Clayton, author of Conservation Psychology puts its nicely so I will quote her here:
“The goal of environmental education is to develop a world population that is aware of, and concerned about, the environment and its associated problems, and which had the knowledge, skills, attitudes, motivations, and commitment to work individually and collectively toward solutions of current problems and the prevention of new ones. “
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Environmental Education is vital to changing common perceptions about environmental policies, science, protecting resources, and creating sustainable lifestyles (Tekbiyik & Çelik, 2019). It encourages students’ attitudes and beliefs towards sustainability, it also increases their interest in the sciences, and brings awareness to sociopolitical issues. The importance of early environmental engagement and education is something that is cross cultural and globally recognized (Barrable, 2019). Currently the world is split between the anthropocentric and the non-anthropocentric natural world views where the non anthropocentric attaches morality to plants, animals, and nature in general.
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We know that Environmental education is important, survey findings from 2001 indicate that 75% of adults think environmental education is as important as English, and 86% agreed that governments should support environmental learning programs (Clayton & Myers, 2015).
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Great, were on the same page with the importance of teaching, but are the teachers? In 2010 a study found that many teachers lacked “content knowledge needed to teach” environmental Education and at the same time showed a fear of the outdoors and nature (Hug, 2010). In another study, also done in 2010, elementary teachers self reported that they spent a minimal amount of time devoted to environmental education, only 1.3% of classroom time (Clayton & Myers, 2015).
The education of our teachers was found to be lacking. Studies have found that environmental educator content was inconsistent in universities across North America, and that it was often reliant on those university teachers’ personal interest and knowledge base (Weiland & Morrison, 2013). What a wicked circle!
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When teachers are more self-confident are able to be more scientifically creative and develop content for their students. Good news is that teachers can learn how to integrate the environment into their lesson content fairly quickly when instruction focuses on content or is method based(Weiland & Morrison, 2013). And when teachers approach environmental education in an interdisciplinary fashion, they are able to feel more confident about the content. (Helvaci & Helvaci, 2019).
So the question remains then, how do we increase teacher confidence in the ability to be an environmental educator?
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It begins with love and curiosity.
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Mrs. Simpson
My name is Debbie Simpson and I am a primary school teacher. You don't think Debbie Simpson the same mrs. My name is mrs. I do. I don't say, well, I don't see your name because of this. All right. Do you want me to do this? Just go with the game. I'm Mrs Simpson and I teach agreed to three class my primary teaching specialist.
DS
Do you do you see yourself as an environmental educator?
Mrs. Simpson
Absolutely. Absolutely. I think it is. It is critical that we we teach our children and we bring and bring the environment into everything we do. I've seen a growing emphasis on environmentalism in our elementary school curriculum each province decides what their students will be learning. Although I have to say, I'm very proud of our B.C. Ministry of Education and the way they've opened up education to big ideas and letting the children drive their education. I like that. I believe they're learning more about how to teach about our environment. And I think, too, they're a little more passionate than some of some of my generation.
Mrs. Simpson
All of my students learn to recycle in multiple ways and it's a big part of their job in the classroom. They love it. That's a coveted job. The recycler. They get to escape the building and go out to the big bins in the back. So cute. We do regular neighborhood cleanups, garbage cleanups, and they love it because they get to go out with big tongs and gloves and buckets and pick up garbage. And that's a big competition. And they have fun. But they're also looking at how many people just are not thinking and just throw things away that could be recycled or deposited in better ways.
DS
Oh, what about what about all the field trips?
Mrs. Simpson
That's my favorite thing. And aside from going to the symphony, all of our field trips are outdoors and discovering more about the world around us. It's sad that we can't go this year, but they love to go to Grouse Mountain. That's a great one. And we learn about our our local animals and we learn about the First Nations and their perspective on things. And is the kids love it even a walk in Lynn Valley? Is it special to them? You know, I was thinking in my Father's Day back in the 40s when he was a little boy, he would roam 20 miles away from home, was not unheard of. They'd be gone for the day and pack a lunch. My generation in the 60s and 70s, we might have gone a mile or two from home. And today's children. Do not even walk a block away from home independently. Their world has shrunk and it's up to us to introduce them back into into the natural world and help them discover the beauty of it and connect to it because without that connection. We don't have a hope. I give my kids missions all the time to teach their parents things at a well. For example, it was just Earth Day. And so I sent home a couple of challenge pages of all kinds of things. Make sure your parents are turning off the water when they brush their teeth and using light bulbs that are economical on electricity. And there aren't leaks in that at your on your taps. And so they they rose to the challenge that they love when they have an opportunity to share things that their parents might not know.
DS
In these unprecedented times, isn't what are you doing to kind of encourage your kids to still stay enviromental?
Mrs. Simpson
Well, I'm turning them all into backyard naturalists, and they're going to be doing some observations of their the. The life rate in their own backyard. And even for the children in apartments and condos, they have they have grounds around their building that they can explore. And I think they're going to be surprised to discover how many things live with them right in their own yards. Something else I would love to promote is the scouting movement. So whether it's Girl Guides or Boy Scouts, they do a great job of introducing children to our natural world and giving them opportunities to get out there and explore it. So it's it's a fairly economical activity for your child to be involved in. Boy, do they learn a lot.
DS
I found in my psychological research I was doing, I found that there's kind of like an like an age that you have to really instill environmental awareness. And that's eleven years old
Mrs. Simpson
Yeah. Do you know why?
DS
Why
Mrs. Simpson
Probably because up until that point, children are very concrete in their thinking. Around the age of eleven is when your mind starts to be able to really think in shades of gray. So there might not be a right and wrong answer. So you're starting to do more critical thinking at that age. So if you've instilled a belief system before then. Then that informs your critical thinking. Well, that's that's a lot of what I've been doing is just looking at I quickly realized I oh, a lot of this education and digging into like. That's why I love teaching. Every little brain is different every every year. I've got a whole new set of incredible little minds to get to know and work with.
Mrs. Simpson
I truly believe that our children are the future. I truly believe that unless they can become connected and impassioned, we could be in a world of trouble. My generation has dropped the ball. The generation before mine really dropped the ball. And we're counting on the kids to pick it up.
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​DS
Introducing living and non-living things to children is important because it allows them to grasp where the place of human beings is in the natural world, as well nature education has been found to increase environmental awareness for all age groups (Yilmaz & TaÅŸ, 2018).
Students at schools with environmental educator were found to have increased environmental behaviours, as well many gains were made not only when students worked together but when they worked with adults (Clayton & Myers, 2015).
Interestingly another study showed that children are influencing their parents, 60% of parents of children in elementary school felt they were influenced by the environmental education, and conversely 75% of children thought they were influencing their parents (Clayton & Myers, 2015). Parents can further be reached by incorporating them into school projects that involve the environment and allow children to be the teachers and relate daily lives to natural environments (Clayton & Myers, 2015).
Environmental education instills critical thinking fosters societal values, and promotes desirable behaviours and in such it can “play a roll in integrating environmental science content, community awareness and the sociopolitical (Weiland & Morrison, 2013).
The UN aims to foster awareness for ecological interdependence, to provide everyone with education, instill values, attitudes and skills to protect the environment and create new patterns of behaviour (UNESCO-UNEP, 2005).
Actionable step:
Humans instinctively want to connect to the natural world around them, and the idea that there is a ‘critical time’ to make this connection has been proposed and supported by the UN since the 90’s. Researchers have thus suggested that strengthening an environmental identity before the age of 11 is necessary to instill a lasting connection (Barrable, 2019). Environmental education is unbelievable important to becoming a sustainable species and engaging in the natural world in a beneficial way. There are some ways to increase your own natures connectedness, however. First you can anthropomorphize nature, that means ascribing humanlike feelings and features, second you can take some time to be mindful and notice the beauty of nature around you, and third you can engage with nature through emotions, empathy and compassion (Barrable, 2019).
Outro:
This podcast was produced and edited by me, Devon Simpson. Supervised by Jane Waters and brought to you by Capilano University. With Special thanks to Debby Simpson from LGCA.
You can reach us on Instagram at WildWaypod or WildWaypodcast@gmail.com
You can find our show notes on our website
Please subscribe to our channel and invite your friends!
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