The Effect of Environmental Education on Schoolchildren, Their Parents, and Community Members: A Study of Intergenerational and Intercommunity Learning

Abstract

The authors examined the hypothesis that children learn and retain conservation principles in school environments and transfer them to their parents. Elementary school students in a Costa Rican village received a 1-month environmental education course on Scarlet Macaw conservation and natural history. Students, their parents, and an adult control group were given a 21-question pretest and the same test upon conclusion of the course (first posttest) and 8-months later (second posttest). Comparing correct responses between the pretest and first posttest, students improved significantly on 71% of questions, parents improved on 38% of the questions, and the adult control group improved on none of the questions. Comparing correct responses between the pretest and second posttest, students improved significantly on 67%, parents on 52% and the control group on 29%. The authors theorize that parents learned from children and both groups transmitted course information to neighbors (control group) resulting in an increase in control group learning.