Educação Ambiental: questões políticas e pedagógicas

<table id="announcementDescription" width="100%"><tbody><tr><td><p><strong>Guest editors: Dr. Fikile Nxumalo (University of Texas at Austin) and Dr. Nikki Rotas (University of Alberta)</strong></p><p>A growing body of work has illustrated the importance of situating environmental education in current precarious times that disrupt idealized notions of both childhood and nature/environment. Drawing inspiration from feminist scholarship and from the environmental humanities, several scholars have critically engaged with ways in which the notion of the Anthropocene, as a current epoch marked by devastating human impact on the earth, necessitates a turn away from romantic conceptions of children and nature (Pacini-Ketchabaw & Taylor, 2015; Malone, Truong & Gray, 2017; Ritchie, 2015). This work supports an orientation towards critical and generative pedagogies that are firmly situated within the messy anthropogenic worlds that young children co-inhabit, and that take seriously the inseparability of nature and culture. Importantly, this work has also taken up the Anthropocene as a contested political marker of current times rather than a neutral scientific fact (Lloro-Bidart, 2016; Colebrook, 2016; Saldanha & Stark, 2016; Tuck & McKenzie, 2014). Taking up the political signification of the Anthropocene in early childhood education includes challenging the figure of the developing human child as future steward – a common trope of nature based education that is rooted in instrumental approaches to teaching and learning (Blaise, 2013; Lenz Taguchi, 2010; Taylor, in press). In addition, methodological attention to ‘how’ Anthropocene discourses manifest in early childhood settings and across disciplinary frameworks is important. How, for example, do environmental education practices materialize in schools and communities? In what ways do current environmental education practices affirm the capacity of students and/or reiterate deficit racialized discourses in schools? How might creative and critical practices ‘presence’ (Simpson, 2011) Indigenous land and communities in present place and time? </p><p>Building from these and other insights on the potential invigorations of bringing interdisciplinary perspectives into conversation with early childhood environmental education, this special issue invites further critical and creative interventions into questions of research and practice in early childhood. In this special issue, we invite papers that reconceptualize environmental education in ways that situate teaching and learning within current environmental precarities, intervene into dominant child-nature discourses, trouble normative methodologies, and unsettle the universalisms and omissions of the Anthropocene. In this regard, submissions are invited that are animated by, but not limited to:</p><ul><li>Black studies + environmental education + childhood</li><li>Black/immigrant childhoods in the Anthropocene</li><li>Indigenous land education + environmental early childhood education</li><li>Decolonizing place based early education</li><li>#WaterIsLife + childhood</li><li>Toxic pollutants + childhood entanglements</li><li>Discard studies + environmental education + childhood</li><li>Critical disability studies + environmental education + childhood</li><li>Queering childhood-nature relationships</li><li>Speculative practices + creative methodologies in environmental education</li><li>Material Technologies + Environmental Education + Childhood</li><li>Arts-based early childhood pedagogies for the Anthropocene</li><li>Climate change + environmental early childhood education</li><li>STEM + the environmental humanities in early childhood education</li><li>Multispecies relations + childhood in the Anthropocene</li><li>Affect + Environmental Education + Childhood</li><li>Urban education + the Anthropocene</li><li>New Material feminisms + environmental early childhood education</li></ul><p>We seek submissions that push current boundaries of environmental education with young children by engaging interdisciplinary perspectives in critical, creative and generative ways while disrupting anthropocentric, deficit images of children and families. We welcome submissions in multiple formats, including qualitative and post-qualitative research articles, conceptual essays, digital media pieces, aesthetic works, reviews, and interviews. We also encourage submissions from educators working in early childhood settings for the <a href="/index.php/jcs/about/editorialPolicies#sectionPolicies">Ideas from Practice</a> section of the journal. </p><p>Submissions are due August 1, 2017. Please see the <a href="/index.php/jcs/about/submissions#onlineSubmissions" target="_blank">author guidelines</a> for submission preparation instructions. Please contact Fikile Nxumalo (fnxumalo@austin.utexas.edu) and Nikki Rotas (rotas@ualberta.ca) with any questions. </p><p> </p><p>References</p><p>Blaise, M. (2013). Activating micropolitical practices in the early years: (Re)assembling bodies and participant observations. In R. Coleman and J. Ringrose (Eds.) <em>Deleuze and research methodologies,</em> pp. 184–200. Edinburgh: Edinburgh UniversityPress.</p><p>Colebrook, C. (2016). ‘A grandiose time of co-existence’: Stratigraphy of the Anthropocene. <em>Deleuze Studies, 10</em>(4), 440-454.</p><p>Lenz Taguchi, H. (2010). <em>Going beyond the theory/practice divide in early childhood education: Introducing an intra-active pedagogy</em>. New York, NY: Routledge.</p><p>Lloro-Bidart, T. (2016). A feminist posthumanist political ecology of education for theorizing human-animal relations/relationships. <em>Environmental Education Research, (23)</em>1, 111-130.</p><p>Malone, K., Truong, S., & Gray, T. (2017). <em>Reimagining sustainability in precarious times</em>. Singapore : Springer.</p><p>Pacini-Ketchabaw, V. & Taylor, A. (2015). (Eds.) <em>Unsettling the Colonialist Places and Spaces of Early Childhood Education.</em> New York: Routledge.</p><p>Ritchie, J. (2015). Social, cultural, and ecological justice in the age the Anthropocene: A New Zealand early childhood care and education perspective<em>. Journal of Pedagogy, (6)</em>2, 41- 56.</p><p>Saldanha, A. & Stark, H. (2016). A new earth: Deleuze and Guattari in the Anthropocene. <em>Deleuze Studies, 10</em>(4), 427-439.</p><p>Simpson, L. (2011). <em>Dancing on our turtle’s back: Stories of Nishnaabeg re-creation, resurgence, and a new emergence</em>. Winnipeg: Arbeiter Ring Publishers.</p><p>Taylor, A. (in press) Beyond stewardship: Common world pedagogies for the Anthropocene, <em>Environmental Education Research</em>.</p><p>Tuck, E. & McKenzie, M. (2014). <em>Place in research: Theory, methodology, and methods.</em> New York: Routledge.</p></td></tr></tbody></table>

A pesquisa teve por objetivo analisar as práticas interdisciplinares em Educação Ambiental (EA) propostas ou implementadas na educação básica, descritas em teses e dissertações brasileiras. A multidimensionalidade presente nas questões ambientais e a importância da abordagem da EA, em todos os níveis escolares, numa perspectiva interdisciplinar, motivou a escolha do tema deste estudo. Buscou-se investigar a seguinte questão central: que concepções de Interdisciplinaridade, Ambiente e EA podem ser depreendidas da análise das pesquisas acadêmicas sobre práticas interdisciplinares em Educação Ambiental na educação básica? De um universo de 2.763 trabalhos, defendidos entre 1981 e 2012 e constantes do Banco de Teses do Projeto EArte, foram localizadas apenas 21 pesquisas relativas a esse objeto de estudo. Os documentos foram lidos, descritos e classificados quanto aos dados institucionais (autor, orientador, ano de defesa, instituição de ensino superior, programa de pós-graduação, unidade federativa, dependência administrativa, grau de titulação acadêmica) e quanto à prática interdisciplinar em Educação Ambiental, conforme os descritores: ano ou série escolar, tipo de escola, disciplinas abrangidas nas práticas, métodos e estratégias de ensino, recursos e materiais didáticos, tipo de integração curricular, referencial teórico-pedagógico, público envolvido e a interação entre ele, nível de integração disciplinar, concepção de ambiente, concepção de EA e sua manifestação curricular. As pesquisas concentraram-se, fortemente, na década de 2000, com dezoito trabalhos. As práticas analisadas, em sua maioria, centraram suas ações nos anos iniciais do ensino fundamental, desenvolvidas a partir de temas geradores ou projetos de ensino. Os materiais didáticos utilizados foram os comumente encontrados nas escolas, de baixo custo, além de atividades externas. As ações pedagógicas vincularam-se às propostas curriculares das escolas e as disciplinas mais envolvidas (sempre em conjunto com outras) foram Geografia e Língua Portuguesa, seguidas de Matemática, Ciências, História e Artes. Os pais e a comunidade assumiram papel cooperativo nas práticas e notou-se uma relação hierárquica quanto à decisão da proposta de trabalho por parte dos professores e pesquisadores para com os alunos; contudo, tanto no aceite da proposta, quanto no desenvolvimento das atividades pedagógicas, observou-se intensa participação dos estudantes. Dezoito práticas foram consideradas como interdisciplinares e três pluridisciplinares. Nas práticas analisadas predominou a concepção de ambiente integrado e de Educação Ambiental numa perspectiva crítica, manifestada como elemento essencial e integrado ao currículo escolar. Conforme a análise das pesquisas revelou, muito embora os professores demonstrassem interesse pela EA e pela prática interdisciplinar, não se encontravam preparados para esse tipo de trabalho, ao que se sugere investimento na formação continuada e revisitação nos cursos de formação inicial de professores.

The problem about degraded streams is a matter of citizenship that must pervade the school life.The approach on these questions in the perspective of Environmental Education is a way to moveindividuals in order to develop awareness to preserve water sources. The general objective of thiswork consists in analyzing, under the view of the Environmental Education in the school, theproblem about degraded streams. The specific objectives are: to relate the methodologicalproposal of the Study Situations to the Environmental Education and; reflect about thepreservation of the streams in the perspective of the Environmental Education in the school. Themethodological approach used in this research consists of a bibliographic review in order to gatherinformation, which is systematized, synthesized and reorganized after critical reflection of theauthors, and construct (or reconstruct) ideas by creating a theoretical frame which is able to support or subsidize approaches, in the school, on degraded streams, in the perspective of theEnvironmental Education and the strategy of the Study Situations. The Environmental Education inthe school is a dialogical way for the students to become aware, by means of their individual andcollective experiences, of the importance of the preservation of water sources and the adoption ofmeasures for mitigation of the negative anthropic impact on Brazilian streams, while the StudySituations are an adequate methodology to the sensitization of the individuals because thesesituations work with specific knowledge allied to social matters, contextualizing in this way theteaching proposals to the reality of each single school.

Objective: The objective of this study is to analyze the challenges of environmental management and education faced in the state of Pará, with the aim of identifying strategies and practices that can promote sustainable development, considering the geographic, socioeconomic, and cultural specificities of the region. Theoretical Framework: The research is based on concepts related to environmental management and environmental education, highlighting the contributions of Jacobi (2013), Loureiro (2014), and Neto et al. (2019). The Brazilian legal framework is also explored, including the Federal Constitution of 1988 and the National Policy for Environmental Education (Law No. 9,795/1999). Method: The methodology adopted was a qualitative and descriptive approach, based on bibliographic research. Data collection was carried out through consultations and analyses of books, periodicals, specialized magazines and online sources, seeking an in-depth understanding of the challenges and potential solutions for environmental management and education in Pará. Results and Discussion: The results revealed that environmental management and education in Pará face challenges such as illegal deforestation, lack of public awareness, absence of integrated and effective public policies, and lack of financial resources and infrastructure. The discussion contextualizes these challenges with the theoretical framework, highlighting the need for coordinated actions between government, society and the productive sector. Research Implications: The implications of this research cover the areas of environmental management and education, with emphasis on the promotion of public policies aimed at sustainability, strengthening environmental governance and expanding educational programs. Such measures can positively impact environmental preservation and sustainable economic development in the state of Pará. Originality/Value: This study contributes to the literature by addressing the specific challenges faced by environmental management and education in one of the regions richest in biodiversity in the world. Its relevance lies in proposing an integrated and multidisciplinary approach to address socio-environmental problems in Pará, promoting sustainable practices and greater social awareness.

The action competence (AC) concept originated in the Research Centre for Environmental and Health Education at the Royal Danish School of Educational Studies in the early 1990s. The AC concept is formulated as a Bildung (political and democratic formation) perspective on the purpose of education, focusing on what it means to be educated. The twinning of AC as an overall perspective on the purpose of education—a “democratic curriculum perspective,” with a concept of competence, as well as the pliability of the latter, where components can be added or removed—would seem to partly explain why AC has proved to be a useful concept in a range of cultural contexts and educational fields. Rooted in the tradition of participatory and democratic education, it has played a central role in the related fields of environmental, health, and sustainability education. These have traditionally been viewed as different fields of education but work toward the UN’s Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development has led to a recent development of literature with a potential to bridge these fields. While environmental educators concentrate on providing educational activities that foster learning about challenges to the flourishing of communities of life on Earth, health educators focus on learning experiences designed to facilitate voluntary actions conducive to health. The sustainability term addresses environmental, economic, and social dimensions in education, drawing attention to issues of inequality, social justice, and good health and well-being across the globe (see Oxford Bibliographies article on Education for Sustainable Development). Thus, sustainability connects to different fields of education, including environmental education, education for sustainable development, peace education, development education, citizenship education, and health and well-being education. Based on the continuous and widespread use of the AC concept in the related research fields of environmental, health, and sustainability education over the last three decades, it seems fair to point out that it contains a general critical potential in relation to such boundary crossing. The General Overviews section will provide insight into the origin, uptake, and development of the AC concept in literature and practice, whereafter a section on conceptualizations of AC follows. The next four sections describe how AC has been understood and used over time while the concluding section addresses three main tensions in the AC concept.

Studies in the field of environmental education need to be continuously promoted in line with the increasing number of environmental problems. The purpose of this systematic literature review (SLR) was to review and compare investigations of researches on articles published by one Indonesian Scopus Indexed journal i.e., Jurnal Pendidikan IPA Indoneia (JPII) so that they are expected to have significant contributions to the topic of environmental education. This systematic literature review adopts five-step guidelines. The study standards that meet the requirements were as follows: (1). The data used were from the 2012-2021 publication year; (2) articles published in English; (3) Full paper can be accessed; (4) related to the theme of environmental education. It can be concluded that JPII is a pro-environment education journal. JPII publishes 26 articles related to the theme of environment education. The most frequently used keywords were environmental education and students. JPII's important contribution in the theme of environmental education is to provide a real example of the implementation of SETS and to emphasize that the success of implementing environmental education depends on the models, methods, techniques, and tools that are continuously developed by experts.

The aim of this paper was to explore how and why senior phase teachers are capable or incapable of integrating environmental education in teaching and learning process. From anecdotal evidence during the work integrated learning process, it was observed that teachers do not necessarily integrate environmental education, and this became the purpose of the study to find out why they do not. Consequently, a research method used was qualitative interpretative multiple case study design in one of the districts of the Mpumalanga province in South Africa. We selected three teachers who separately teach life orientation, natural sciences, and technology in grade 7 as participants from the schools. Data collection tools were interviews and observations. Teachers were interviewed in their schools and some of their lessons were observed. Data was analysed using a typology approach. We inferred from the results and findings of the paper that these teachers had problems with the integration of environmental education. The problems ranged from the lack of understanding of what is environmental education to misconceptions of the concepts of environment and environmental education. With these challenges it is not surprising that even the ones that could integrate were not aware that they did integrate environmental education. It is therefore suggested that it was not a lost cause at all as they had glimpses of how to integrate environmental education which argues well for the recommendation that the micro foundation of in-service interventions to capacitate teachers on how to integrate environmental education across all the subjects should be done. Further studies are recommended on the effectiveness of the in-service workshops that focuses on the integration of environmental education.

Communication about nature and the environment was important throughout the history of humankind. Humans learned about their environment by observation, by leaving adverse conditions or trying to overcome unfavourable condition in the nature by practical solutions.The exchange of information altered from oral to written and to digital, and from local to global. As an important result, the available amount of information simply exploded. However, it is reasonable to assume that especially local knowledge in many regions has disappeared.The development of environmental education represents a chronological sequence, which in general can be subdivided in five consecutive steps: 1. Communication of disaster stories and religious narratives (at local scales) 2. Education in religious institutions and schools about water and food production, nature, medicine, astronomy, religion, and other disciplines with the idea to enable human life and solve social problems (at regional scales) 3. Scientific education of modern concepts to solve environmental problems including ecosystem services and biodiversity conservation (at regional to supra-national scales) 4. Transdisciplinary exchange of scientific information and education of children, students, the public and stakeholders in economy and politics with the purpose to limit environmental disaster and species extinction (at regional to supra-national scales) 5. Environmental education which enables avoidance of environmental catastrophes, species extinction and social disasters (at all spatial scales) These phases can be seen as logical sequence of the past. However, the development in the past was not that clearly arranged as different aspects occurred at different times and in different regions independently. Today a combination of the first three steps is still globally relevant. Culturally different accentuation is realized at regional scales.The fourth step is only partially achieved and has to be intensified. The fifth step simply has not been reached, yet. However, diverse educational programmes show a strong effort to avoid environmental disaster based on scientific knowledge across all disciplines, which are related to human wellbeing, health, survival, animal welfare, and survival of species and ecosystems.The formal establishment of environmental education (EE) started in the middle of the twentieth century due to a worldwide growing concern about environmental problems. The concepts of environmental education and education for sustainable development (ESD) meanwhile are established in educational systems across the world.However, also these concepts today are intermingled between short-term perspectives (health, wellbeing, profit) and long-term perspectives (survival of ecosystems and biodiversity, resource use, recycling), and between nature conservation and development. Furthermore, dependent on the concept different aspects of economy, social science, and ecology are merged with the effect that the target course sometimes is getting rather weak.The central purpose of biodiversity conservation education (BCE) is the analysis and intermediation of the relationship between nature and culture, evolution and extinction, species and ecosystem, natural constraints and human possibilities. In general the term biodiversity is more related to natural sciences while conservation is part of the ethical-social discourse. Thus, also BCE requires the contribution of various disciplines.Modern concepts such as EE, ESD, and BCE have to respect, disentangle and analyze extremely complex problem areas including gaps of knowledge. EE and ESD promote multiple and sometimes competing goals. Furthermore, due to the holistic approach, the targets of ESD are partially ambiguous, while BCE is related to smaller and clearer targets.Since many environment-related education approaches are interdisciplinary if not holistic, school curricula of traditional core disciplines often do not provide enough space for relating contributions.Independent of the different positions and phases, the enlargement and intensification of environmental education in public schools and media is seen as an important measure parallel to political decisions and practical management of ecosystems.KeywordsEnvironmental education (EE)Education for sustainable development (ESD)Biodiversity conservation education (BCE)

Environmental education is becoming an essential subject as the environment changes rapidly with human activities. To protect the environment, several countries implemented environmental education acts. Taiwan is the sixth country in the world that implemented an act for environmental protection and sustainability. This study reports the 20-year journey of development and the pioneer status of environmental education act into practice. The Ministry of Education of Taiwan and Environmental Protection Agency jointly proposed the environmental education programme in 1992 to create awareness the on environment protection and develop knowledge, attitudes, skills and values necessary for improving the environment. The Environmental Protection Agency is responsible for accrediting qualified environmental education institutions to handle environmental education personnel training, curriculum plan and management, provide professional service of environmental education with rich ecology, etc. During 2011 to 2019, 200 students in 17 cities were issued environmental education certificates and became qualified environmental education personnel. The number of environmental education personnel in Taiwan has increased every year after the implementation of the Environmental Education Law. This study also provides suggestions of integrating environmental education into the school curriculum and the establishment of corporate social responsibility towards environmental education.

The global process of information society, as well as changes taking place in Ukraine, require significant changes in many areas of state activity. This is especially true of education reform. Today, national programs provide for the development of education based on new progressive concepts, introduction of the latest pedagogical technologies and scientific achievements in the educational process, creation of a new system of information support of education, Ukraine’s entry into the transcontinental computer information system. Information technologies are qualitatively changing the key resources of development: this is no longer a space with fixed production, but primarily mobile finance and intelligence. They have a direct impact on the formation of personal growth, professional content and self-organization, emotional and psychological maturity and consciousness, and so on. One of the main factors in ensuring the stability of socio-economic development of the country is the culture of security, the formation and development of which is an urgent problem today. Comprehensive and systematic development of safety culture will significantly increase the preparedness of the population, the level of environmental, labor and patriotic education, reduce human losses, material damage from emergencies. Ecological education can be most successfully carried out only continuously and in accordance with the sociopsychological periods of personality development: kindergarten – school – college – institutions of higher education. The creation of such a system of environmental education should be enshrined as the basis of state environmental policy as a constitutional norm with the use of information technology. The creation of such a system of environmental education should be enshrined as the basis of state environmental policy as a constitutional norm. Graduates of higher education institutions, namely the future of our people, after studying basic environmental education must have a high level of environmental culture, which, in turn, is part of the general culture of man, and professionally approach environmental issues from the standpoint of their profession. It is known that with the help of environmental education is formed the collective intelligence of society, which can predict (predict) human activities and processes occurring in nature, and in some way to manage the elimination of crisis phenomena. It is through environmental education that another system of human values is being formed, which places great emphasis on intangible wealth and solidarity, and great responsibility of humanity for the ecological state of the native state; provides a higher standard of living as a result of sustainable development, through the introduction of information technology in this system. To improve the quality of life, we need better knowledge, which must be implemented at the international level.

It is noted that there has recently been a marked change in senior corporate management attitudes and priorities regarding impacts of company operations on the natural environment. This new emphasis requires fresh efforts to educate managers and employees about basic environmental issues and standards, and about the concepts and tools of corporate environmental management. Through the education of future corporate managers and in retraining existing ones, business schools-in partnership with industry-have a pivotal role to play. The Management Institute for Environment and Business (MEB) was created in 1990 to provide support to those schools and programs that were attempting to embrace environmental issues in the curriculum, and to engage companies to directly participate in the educational process. In 1992 MEB established partnerships with five universities that wanted to become leaders in environmental management education. The Pilot Program in Environmental Management Education has become a highly focused, unique experiment aimed at changing the way environmental management education is delivered. It is designed to generate and test innovative educational techniques that improve the environmental competence of business school graduates. >

This study characterized the Collective of Educators from Sao Carlos, Araraquara, Jaboticabal and Region (CESCAR) based on the narratives of the participants and verified how their life histories have contributed to their education process as environmental educators. In total 46 people involved in CESCAR participated in this study, writing about their histories/experiences in the environmental area. The theoretical framework consisted of Narratives and Textual Discourse Analysis. The narrative analysis showed the relationship between the environmental educator's life history and education, characterizing CESCAR as a group of people from different areas of knowledge, committed with socio-environmental issues and policies. It was also observed that the interest about environmental issues emerges in different life stages and for different reasons. Thus, these results indicate that the education process of environmental educators from CESCAR is closely related to their life history.

It has become undeniable that language learners should be aware of global problems. One of the most serious problems of our globe today is the environmental degradation and education practices should have a contribution to ecological conservation. Environmental education, which is a developing field of study, aims to equip learners with the skills to identify and take action against ecological problems. In order to be able to take part in this solution process, English language learners should especially have critical thinking and critical reading skills. This paper suggests using Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy in an environmental education framework for fostering English language learners’ skills required for critical reading of authentic texts related to ecology and increasing their environmental awareness. In this respect, first, an application of the taxonomy in Monroe & Andrews et al.’s (2007) Environmental Education Strategies Framework is presented. Then, in order to exemplify the use of the taxonomy with an environmental education perspective, a set of reading questions which can be used for the critical reading of an authentic text is suggested. Our Iceberg is Melting: Changing and Succeding Under Any Conditions (2005), written by John Kotter and Holger Rathgeber as a fable, has been chosen as the sample authentic text. It is concluded that environmental education practices can be incorporated in English language teaching by fostering critical reading skills with the suggested approach and authentic texts on ecological issues can be used as classroom material for this purpose.

The ERIC bibliographic database has more than 18,500 citations related to a broadly defined concept of environmental education (nature education or outdoor education or ecology education). Nearly 9,900 are periodical articles and nearly 8,800 are ERIC documents (ED). The oldest citation retrieved is a 125-page report, Conservation Education in Rural Schools: Yearbook, published in February 1943, by Effie C. Bathurst, and the most recent (as of February 7, 2008) is the journal article, How Does Your Garden Grow? Teaching Preschool Children about the Environment by Susan D. Witt and Katherine P. Kimple, published in Early Child Development and Care in January 2008. For millennia humans have recorded their impressions about their surroundings. Long before there were written languages, people created images on cave walls, stone tablets, pottery, and sculptures. Today we rely on the instantaneous electronic transmission of ideas, perceptions, and concepts about the places - our environments - where we live, work and play. Our interactions with other peoples, species, and resources in these environments provide us with learning experiences. These experiences, in turn, provide us with an awareness of who we are and how we are related to all that is around us. This is the essence of environmental education: to study and explore the living and nonliving natural resources that surround us and to better understand the complexities of their interactions, to quantify their existence, and assure their viability; all while fostering a sense of responsibility and respect for all of those resources. The best way to promote that responsibility and respect is development of environmental education in the context of providing a greater understanding of the scientific basis of those natural resources in settings to demonstrate the socioeconomic, political, and cultural relationships that will forge a better understanding for environmentally responsible and sustainable behaviors. For many decades a number of environmental organizations, such as the National Wildlife Federation, the National Audubon Society, and the Sierra Club, have used environmental education to solicit support for their causes. Conservation groups, such as Trout Unlimited, Ducks Unlimited, and more regional groups like the Adirondack Mountain Club have a long history of developing a wide range of environmental, nature, or outdoor education programs. These environmental education activities have been provided through their attempts to educate the public at-large about specific issues related to the need for conserving natural resources, improving ecological conditions on which plants and animals are dependent for their survival, and assuring the healthy quality of environmental conditions to maintain or improve a perceived quality of life and living. So important was this new and emerging concept of environmental education that the U.S. Congress enacted a law to provide and protect it: The National Environmental Educat ion Act (NEEA) of 1990 calls on the EPA to provide national leadership to increase environmental literacy. The Act encourages partnerships and builds upon longstanding ef forts conducted in the environmental educat ion f ield by Federal and State agencies, educational inst itut ions, non-prof it organizat ions, and the pr ivate sector. To implement the Act , EPA's Environmental Educat ion Division in Washington, DC, along with support from environmental educat ion coordinators in the 10 Regional EPA of f ices, has developed the following mission and goals . The mission is to advance and suppor t educat ion ef forts to develop an environmentally conscious and responsible public, and to inspire in all individuals a sense of personal responsibility for the care of the environment . The goals include: expand communicat ion and partnerships; educate youth to protect the environment ; promote the pursuit of environmental careers; educate the adult public to increase environmental literacy; and educate across international boundaries. …

The concepts of Environment and Environmental Education (EE) were characterized by a sample of teachers from four rural schools in Bogotá. EE currents were regarded as a theoretical reference (Sauvé, 2010), an aspect considered for the methodology and analysis of information. Interviews were conducted by applying the Multiple Item Classification and using environmental news images. The aim was for teachers to make classifications according to their knowledge and experiences. Based on their own descriptions, the classifications were categorized pursuant to EE currents. The information obtained made it possible to establish that educators have different ways of addressing the environmental issue and associating it with their educational practice. There was a strong tendency to assume that the Environment and EE are a biological and conservationist issue, basic aspects for life in the countryside.