Abstract
Based on the indeterminate character of the sustainability concept, a procedural and discursive understanding of sustainability decision making and corresponding approaches for education for sustainability (EFS) is proposed. A set of criteria for teaching strategies to promote sustainability decision making, taking into account the demands of deliberative democracy theory, are presented. These criteria (such as reason, complexity management, critical thinking, etc.) are used to argue for an educational approach that involves the development, justification, and weighting of arguments in combination with an instructional tool called Target-Mat. According to a consequent process orientation, structures for arguing or defining sustainability are not given as authorized standards. Suggestions from previous social discourse are only introduced as controversial pairings—for example, different definitions of sustainability. Examples of student decision-making processes are given to demonstrate the potential of the approach to encourage student reflection and cooperative negotiation that engenders a successive deepening of their argumentation.
Highlights
The promotion of decision making and argumentation in socio-scientific issues is a well-established goal of science education [1,2], and a prominent element of scientific literacy [3,4]
Managing SSI such as natural reserve or resource preservation has developed into part of environmental education with particular requirements for improving students’ decision making [8] and its further development as education for sustainability (EFS)
EFS itself requires a set of multiple skills and competencies [9,10], and is somewhat influenced by early approaches to environmental education [11], which are aimed at encouraging both decision making and action
Summary
The promotion of decision making and argumentation in socio-scientific issues is a well-established goal of science education [1,2], and a prominent element of scientific literacy [3,4]. This raises the question of suitable conditions for decision making for sustainability Such an approach does not have the same problem of an insufficient definition as does a content-based conceptualization of sustainability. Self-reflectivity and constant discursive critical review as well as contextual additivity should be inherent elements of any procedural understanding of sustainability This provides a first answer to the above question of the suitability of educational approaches to reasonable goals. Giving learners the impression that fully worked out and directly instructed and strategies would definitely lead to sustainable solutions has to be avoided This has further consequences for education, and requires the development of coherent instructional approaches that correspond to the process dimension of sustainability discourse. The resulting ideas of deliberation and discourse in decision-making for sustainability are presented, which contain underlying criteria, instructional steps with concrete educational tools, and empirical examples for students’ deliberations after discourse-related interventions
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