Enhancing Education for Sustainable Development Through Geographical Perspectives in Chemistry Teaching

Abstract

Chemistry, with its related technical applications, is of crucial importance for creating a sustainable future. Without chemistry, current challenges will be difficult to solve. Such problems include meeting most of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) announced by the United Nations and adherence to planetary limits, for example, novel chemical substances being released to the environment, biochemical flows, and climate change. Such challenges can, however, only be solved via transdisciplinary approaches. They can never be fully explored by a single discipline only, either in reality or in the context of teaching and learning. In order to strengthen education for sustainable development (ESD), we suggest including geographical perspectives in science education. Geography commits itself to the analysis of human-environment systems and combines social perspectives with those found in the natural sciences. In our opinion, such an approach can increase the educational value of science learning, e.g. in the case of chemistry education. An exploratory interview study with twelve purposefully selected chemistry teachers was recently conducted in order to explore chemistry teachers’ views on implementing geographical perspectives. This study reveals that German chemistry teachers view such inclusion as generally positive, but also recognize limitations in the approach due to curricular and time constraints.