Primary school students’ perceptions of a sustainable future in the context of a Storyline project

Abstract

All human decision-making is based on different expectations and assumptions about the future. Futures literacy, consisting of knowledge, emotions, and skills, is an essential competency for the 21st century. Educational steering documents, as the Finnish national curriculum, state that the teachers shall scaffold the students in problem solving, critical thinking and into a sustainable lifestyle now and in the future. The task is complex and challenging for the teachers. In this study a Storyline project was used as a frame for learning about sustainable living. The aim of the study was to study how students’ perceptions of sustainable futures are visualized through the Storyline project and the meta-reflective dialogue. The research material consists of recorded group interviews with primary school students. The results of the thematic analysis show that different ecological skills, ecological concepts, and entities related to ecological sustainability, as well as cause-and-effect descriptions related to science, are present in the students' descriptions of the future. As emotional skills, students bring out empathy; empathy both for other people and for plants and animals. Students rely on their own competence to involve in sustainable development and as resources they highlight e.g. technological innovations, the importance of scientific knowledge, circular economy thinking as well as learning skills and social skills.