Abstract
As demands on the environment continue to intensify, it becomes increasingly urgent to act sustainably, responsibly and respectfully, to protect and restore environments. Digital technologies, including videoconferencing, mobile apps and virtual and augmented realities, can provide new ways of engaging students in environmental stewardship. Such technologies can pique student interest, while enabling them to capture experiences of local and distal environments, to collect data and share their findings with broader audiences. This article critically explores innovative, formal and informal learning practices in experiential environmental education approaches among schools, families and communities, such as citizen science projects. It draws on qualitative case study vignettes, as well as the authors’ previous work and broader literature, to consider the potential and limitations of such technologies and approaches. The key question concerns how existing and emerging technologies might serve as bridges or barriers to apprenticing young people into globally-minded, environmentally responsible and respectful behaviours.
Highlights
This article critically explores innovative, formal and informal learning practices in experiential environmental education approaches among schools, families and communities, such as citizen science projects
Each vignette focuses on environmental education and digital technology use for children of primary school age, in or beyond school
The article concludes with discussion of a number of implications, framed by consideration of the associated prospects and pitfalls of using digital technologies in environmental education
Summary
Processes such as global warming and rising sea levels already impact all life including human life (Wigley, 2018), and problems such as plastic waste (Wilcox, Van Sebille, & Hardesty, 2015) and habitat destruction (Turner, Oppenheimer, & Wilcove, 2009) are global in scale. We argue that student-centred, inquiry-based approaches, such as project-based learning, are important in providing opportunities for students to engage with local and global real-world problems, sometimes in connection with experts in the field Through these approaches, both schools and broader communities can achieve important pro-environmental outcomes. Each vignette focuses on environmental education and digital technology use for children of primary school age, in or beyond school. The article concludes with discussion of a number of implications, framed by consideration of the associated prospects and pitfalls of using digital technologies in environmental education
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