Environmental Education Research Research Articles

School students’ perceptions of trees and wooden objects in their immediate home environment: Possible implications for school environments

AbstractWe present a county-wide statistically representative survey with 430 Hungarian school students demonstrating that students who have trees in the parental home environment show more positive attitude towards trees and wood than their peers who do not have any. We aimed at finding out about the current attitudes of the upcoming generation with regard to the use of wood and wood materials, and also about the question as to whether they would consciously use wood materials in the future. Results show that school students who have trees in their parental home environment show significantly higher scores on the cognitive, affective, and conative domains of attitude towards trees and wood compared to those who do not have trees in their parental home environment. The present study contributes to outdoor environmental education research in that we provide quantitative evidence for the positive effect of the immediate environment of children on the attitude towards wood and trees. The findings suggest the imperative need for further novel educational interventions in school gardens related to trees and wooden objects.

Synchronizing Environmental Education Research Trends: Promoting Sustainable Practices and Enhancing Scientific Knowledge

This research explores the diversity of topics related to environmental education issues and students’ environmental concerns regarding their behavior. The bibliometric method is a quantitative approach used to measure and investigate specific indicators within the literature published in a particular field. This method involves creating knowledge maps using extensive databases to identify patterns and trends. Using the keyword “environmental education” on Scopus from 2018 to 2023, 365 relevant documents were found. In the PRISMA flow diagram, the process started with 7550 traced documents, narrowing down to 2536 relevant documents through screening. From these, 776 related documents were chosen, and 573 relevant documents were recognized after the inclusion stage. Throughout, a total of 365 publications were included in the study. VOS viewer software was used to analyze data and generate bibliographic maps and networks. In the last five years, research on environmental education has experienced exciting fluctuations. Key sources like Sustainability Switzerland and the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health have played a significant role. Research by Bogner, F.X. stands out, reflecting high interest in environmental issues and education within the scientific community. Universities such as Universidad de Granada and Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia contribute significantly. The United States leads in publications. Environmental education research remains crucial for sustainable practices and environmental literacy despite fluctuations. This data provides essential guidance for future research planning. This research not only underscores the increasing research emphasis on the educational ramifications of pandemics but also identifies specific areas that warrant more extensive exploration.

Presence of microplastics: Impacts in a marine-coastal environment of the Colombian Caribbean

Part of the contamination of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems is influenced by mass production, consumption habits, and improper disposal of plastics. Plastic degradation and fragmentation lead to the formation of Microplastics (MPs), small particles that easily infiltrate natural systems and pose ecological risks. These MPs are transported by atmospheric and water circulation dynamics, predominantly accumulating in soils and bodies of water, disrupting ecological processes in water, land, biosphere, and anthroposphere. This contamination adversely affects human productivity and disturbs fauna and flora in ecosystems. MPs can be consumed and bioaccumulated, potentially carrying pathogenic microorganisms and causing intoxication through constant contact. Understanding the environmental impacts of microplastic presence is crucial to identifying and addressing contamination sources. It serves as a foundation for adopting clean and sustainable production practices, minimizing negative impacts, and maximizing positive effects on ecosystems. Environmental education and scientific research play vital roles in raising awareness and fostering societies' involvement in managing emission sources that disturb sensitive ecosystems.

A comprehensive bibliographic analysis of environmental education research in Russia

This paper presents a detailed and insightful bibliometric analysis of environmental education research in Russia offering an integrated view of progress, impact and main actors of the field. Fundamental information was gained from journal articles, conference papers and other significant academic distributions that were included in the Scopus database. These included measurements involving issues like distributions and references/year, neighboring country comparisons, authorship patterns, affiliations and sources of financial support etc. The analysis of Russian exploration of environmental education presented in the paper provides an outline for further work in a crucial area Russia can be effective here, drawing on its experience with this demand to contribute to the development of environmental education and global sustainability efforts in general.

Analysis of Knowledge Graph: Hotspots and Future Trends in Environmental Education Research

Analysis of Knowledge Graph: Hotspots and Future Trends in Environmental Education Research

City-level sustainable development impacts on environmental literacy: feelings toward nature, environmental knowledge, and pro-environmental behavior

Research in environmental education adopts a broad concept of environmental literacy, recognizing the multifaceted nature that encompasses cognitive, affective, and behavioral components. However, minimal research has examined how these components interact with each other across various cities. The present study aims to fill this gap by investigating the interplay between the components of environmental literacy, such as affiliation with nature, environmental knowledge, and environmental behavior. More importantly, the study explores how these relationships vary across different cities that differ in sustainable development levels. Children (N = 979, M age = 11.13) from 29 cities in China completed measures of affiliation with nature, environmental literacy, and pro-environmental behavior (PEB). We classified the cities into high versus low sustainable development levels using the Low-Carbon and Green Index – a comprehensive measure of sustainable development, including energy consumption, carbon emissions, and public policy. A moderated mediation analysis revealed that environmental knowledge mediated the relation between affiliation with nature and PEB only in cities with higher sustainable levels. As a result, environmental education should be tailored to a city’s sustainable development level to better encourage pro-environmental behavior.

Anthropocosmism: an Eastern humanist approach to the Anthropocene

This paper addresses the discussion on the Anthropocene in environmental education research. It aims to enrich and widen the debate about the appropriateness of humanist approaches to environmental education and sustainability. In response to criticism about anthropocentric responses to human-made environmental destruction, the authors introduce a version of Eastern humanism: Tu Weiming’s ‘Anthropocosmism’. This idea of a non-anthropocentric humanism embedded in the cosmic order is strikingly different from the anthropocentric separatism typical of Western humanism. Moving beyond a blanket condemnation of humanism, this paper explores what a specific, non-Western form of humanism may have to offer in response to anthropogenic ecological crises. The argument is developed that Anthropocosmism can help us fully recognize humans’ exceptional ethical responsibility in light of these crises without falling into the mistake of Western humanism’s dominant discourse that connects this exceptionalism to forms of human superiority over and domination of other-than-human nature.

Climate change education through drama and social learning: Playful inquiry for building extreme weather events adaptation scenarios

Considering the projected impacts of climate change in upcoming decades, innovative educational approaches should encourage inventive problem-solving techniques and societal change, fostering transformative climate adaptation. The value of drama in climate adaptation education remains a novel area in the environmental education research literature and requires further exploration of its potential benefits to Climate Change Education (CCE). This article presents a proposal for CCE to include various elements in a drama workshop by evaluating a methodological framework. Participants in the workshop studied the vulnerabilities that arose from flooding and droughts while dramatizing different social conflicts to develop building adaptation scenarios. Through the exploration of problems via playful activities, participants collaboratively construct narratives and texts rich with meaning, based on a critical and creative perception of themes, needs, desires, and overlapping ideologies. This short-term experience manifests efficacy in elucidating the underpinnings of social systems structures, human values, and motivations. This article analyzes workshop results, providing a pedagogical structure and theoretical foundation, contributing to a better comprehension of drama in education and the creation of capacities towards CCE.

Ecolabeling in Environmental Education: Promoting Eco-friendly Choices Through Education

The degradation of the environment has created a pressing need to promote environmental education. To support environmental improvement and foster a society that prioritizes environmental safety, a study on ecolabel research in environmental education has been initiated in DKI Jakarta. The main objectives of this study are: (1) to identify the indicators of ecolabel and their relationship to environmental education, and (2) to investigate the correlation between ecolabel and environmental education. This research will be conducted using a quantitative descriptive approach. The significance of this study lies in exploring the ecolabel indicators, examining their connection to environmental education, and understanding the relationship between them. The findings from this study will serve as a valuable resource for consumers, enabling them to make informed choices by providing accurate information about a product’s environmental aspects. This will empower individuals to opt for environmentally friendly products with a smaller negative impact on the environment throughout their life cycle, contributing to the goal of environmental sustainability.
 Keywords: ecolabel, environmental education

Drama as a hopeful practice when navigating liminal times

This article presents results from a study where applied drama interventions were deployed in four different groups to build capacities to re-imagine economics. Participants were interviewed or entered dialogue with each other after completing the drama work. Through a close reading of one of the conversations that stands out as glowing in the research material and with inspiration from rhizomatic analysis, we identify four nodes that point to drama as a hopeful practice during insecure times. The dramatic arts have historically facilitated the navigation of localized political and economic tensions, but research and practice has not seemingly addressed the transitions to more holistic forms of development embedded within the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goal 8: Decent Work and Inclusive Economic Growth. Conceptualizing this transition as liminal, we argue for the use of drama(tic) arts to navigate this state. The node Space for emotions articulates drama as a possibility to embrace and integrate difficult emotions. The node Openings and invitations – a new learning experience describes drama as an unconventional form of teaching that opens for creativity and new understandings. The third node Pretending towards new realities points to how the imaginative aspects of drama can give experiences of new pretended states beyond the liminal. Finally, the node Discomfort and its reinterpretations shows how challenging aspects of drama can be understood as in itself creating a liminal state where the unexpected can emerge. Findings echo the transformatory potential of drama(tic) arts in prior environmental and sustainability education research but extend it in the specific context of navigating and re-imagining economic growth (SDG8), and point to specific qualities of drama when trying to move towards sustainability in difficult times.

Learning landscapes through technology and movement: blurring boundaries for a more-than-human pedagogy

ABSTRACT Interest in the role of technology and movement is growing in outdoor environmental education (OEE) research. However, there are many unexamined assumptions involving both non-digital technology and movement for outdoor learners. In this paper, we explore learning landscapes through non-digital technology and movement involving canoe journeys in south-eastern Australia. We examine ways that technology and movement come together to help shape learning orientations through situated examples from OEE fieldwork. Our investigations utilise posthumanist and process-relational theories for exploring onto-epistemological dimensions of outdoor learning. We bring such theory into conversation with photos, videos and student essays to analyse our fieldwork contexts. We highlight that technology and movement cannot be taken for granted; rather, they help constitute the ways we come to know places. We also acknowledge some cultural and conceptual aspects that overlap to influence learning. This paper offers alternative insights for learning landscapes and the mediating influence of technologies.

Unveiling the Role of Zoos in Smart Cities: A Quantitative Analysis of the Degree of Smartness in Kyoto City Zoo

The rapid pace of urbanization and the emergence of social challenges, including an aging population and increased labor costs resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, have underscored the urgency to explore smart city solutions. Within these technologically advanced urban environments, zoos have assumed a pivotal role that extends beyond their recreational functions. They face labor cost challenges and ecological considerations while actively contributing to wildlife conservation, environmental education, and scientific research. Zoos foster a connection with nature, promote biodiversity awareness, and offer a valuable space for citizens, thereby directly supporting the pillars of sustainability, public engagement, and technological innovation in smart cities. This study employs a quantitative analysis to assess the alignment between smart projects and the distinctive characteristics of Kyoto Zoo. Through questionnaires, we collected feedback on performance and importance, and subsequently employed the analytic hierarchy process and the fuzzy integrated evaluation method to obtain quantitative results. The findings reveal the high level of intelligence exhibited by Kyoto Zoo, and the analysis provides insightful guidance that can be applied to other urban facilities. At the same time, we compared Kyoto Zoo with Ueno Zoo to see the difference in intellectualization achievements in different contexts in terms of data and systems.

Landscape changes in the city of Barbacena – Minas Gerais recorded in photographs as a didactic resource for Environmental Education processes: A proposal in the light of Historical-Critical Pedagogy

The present study proposes a critical pedagogical practice in Environmental Education, using as a teaching resource photographic sequences from the city of Barbacena-Minas Gerais, which captured the transformations in its urban environment, with the purpose of awakening in students a critical perception of their reality. local and then think about global issues. For this, the methodological perspectives of Tozoni-Reis (2009) were used about the guidelines in Environmental Education research and the analyzes of the selected photographs were constructed from the method described by Panofsky (1979) contemplating denotative and interpretive elements of the images. Based on analyzes and discussions based on the basic theoretical framework of this study, a proposal was built to be carried out by teachers working in Environmental Education in the light of the path proposed by Saviani (1983) for teaching processes supported by Historical-Critical Pedagogy. It was concluded that the proposed theoretical and practical path opens several possibilities for the generation of critical and sensitive stimuli considering scientific and popular knowledge. In addition, it will enable ties and approximation with the identity of values of the students' community, representing a singularity of community values, memories and singularities, contemplating Emotional and rational skills and building cultural resistances in counterpoint to global reality

A didactic toolkit for climate change educators: lessons from constructive journalism for emotionally sensitive and democratic content design

Climate change education is seen as an important contributor to climate change mitigation. Yet, its predominant focus on cognitive learning tends to omit the emotional effects of learning about climate change, which often entails learners feeling anxious and overwhelmed and therefore struggling to engage with and enact ‘solutions’. This paper addresses a gap in current environmental education research relating to the role that the design of educational content might play in engaging with the emotional dimension of learning in environmental and sustainability education. In this effort, the paper draws on constructive journalism to provide an account of how the design of content influences the appropriation of content on both a cognitive and emotional level by the learner. The paper outlines three content design tools (solutions orientation, future orientation, community orientation) that aim to reconcile the emotional and cognitive dimensions of learning while supporting the agency of learners and a democratic conception of climate change education.

Critical education for sustainable development: exploring the conception of criticality in the context of global and Vietnamese policy discourse

ABSTRACT This paper analyses how ‘criticality’ is negotiated in the global policy frameworks on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and re-conceptualised in Vietnamese ESD policymaking. Taking the context of Viet Nam, this paper reflects on what constitutes criticality in education in the light of cultural and historical contexts of the education systems. The comparative perspective helps explore whether (1) universal or decontextualised ‘criticality’ exists or (2) whether ‘criticality’ is culturally negotiated based on the premise that educational imaginaries of societal formation and transformation are historically and contextually embedded and contingent. In addition, this paper connects the ongoing debate on the critical potential of ESD within the field of environmental education (EE) research to comparative education research by highlighting both what a comparative perspective might offer to EE research and what recent developments in EE research might contribute to comparative education research.

Teaching action-oriented knowledge on sustainability issues

Knowledge about sustainability problems as it is typically taught does not per se lead to action for tackling these problems. Environmental and sustainability education researchers have argued for teaching more action-oriented knowledge. This article addresses the ‘didactical work’ required for teachers to do so, both in preparing and implementing lessons. The authors employ transactional didactic theory and the analytical method Practical Epistemology Analysis to open-up the black box of teaching and learning action-oriented knowledge on sustainability issues. The methodology, that has a strong focus on classroom observations, allows to empirically investigate the influence of teachers’ actions on students’ learning. It is here applied to a case study in higher education where it is engineering teachers’ explicit ambition for their students to explore and develop a wider area of knowledge about sustainability issues. Our findings shed light on what this requires in terms of the ‘scripting’, ‘staging’, and ‘performance’ of lessons.

Sensitivity analysis of trends in environmental education in schools and its implications in the built environment

Environmental education research is diverse, complex and multidisciplinary, with interrelated approaches and contexts. This paper aims to analyse the existing previous initiatives, their organisation in different areas, and the current action strategies for improving management and implementing sustainable criteria and circular economy guidelines. The analysis methodology follows sequential phases: (i) analysis of the bibliographic records of the research field; (ii) performance analysis and mapping of scientific production; and (iii) comparison between the different policy frameworks on Environmental Education and Education for Sustainable Development. This paper analyses the research trends in this field for the period 1968 to 2021. Morever, documents from 21 countries are analysed under various socio-economic contexts to obtain a comprehensive discussion to be replicated through proposals for action in environmental education in the coming years. The analysis shows that Environmental Education started to be included in educational programmes in the early years, taking as a reference green building practices. Over the years, it has evolved through education in consumption habits, promoting the local economy, the reduction of the environmental footprint, and the need to develop inclusive frameworks that address the use of technologies.

환경교육 정책 제안을 위한 교사들의 환경 인식 조사

Objectives The purpose of this study is to investigate teachers' perceptions of environmental education and to use the results as basic data for establishing environmental education policies in Jeollabuk-do.
 Methods To achieve this purpose, a questionnaire was prepared with 4 teachers belonging to the Environmental Education Research Community. The survey was conducted online. The contents of the survey are about environmental issues, overall perceptions of environmental education, and education policies.
 Results As a result of the survey, teachers are highly interested in environmental issues and environmental education, and at the same time, teachers used to teach environmental education integrated with school life rather than establishing a separate guidance plan. Teachers recognized that the support for environmental education was insufficient, and preferred methods of support such as program development and dissemination and expansion of teacher training as a support of The Office of Education.
 Conclusions Based on the results, we would like to suggest the environmental education policies that the Office of Education should support. First, it is necessary to develop a variety of programs that can be used for environmental education and build an easily accessible platform. Second, training contents, methods, places, and opportunities for environmental education that reflect the needs of teachers should be provided. Third, it is necessary to create an environment that leads to daily practice. This study is meaningful in that it confirmed the needs of teachers, who are actually implementing policies, not from the point of view of policymakers. Now is the time to prepare for the next step to put the proposal into action as a policy.

Tbilisi’s “Sounds Of Silence”—(In)action in the policy ≠ embodiments of environmental education

Based in the 1977 Tbilisi formalization of Environmental Education (EE), this memory-work study of contemporary silences in Environmental Education Research (EER) emphasizes an embodied∼materialist theorization and activist conception of ecological experience in EE (eco)pedagogy. Relevant empirical-conceptual research drawn from EER Special Issues (SI) provides an evidence-base for re-storying numerous post-Tbilisi silences. Of central importance in critiquing various policy transitions in EE and frequent theory turns in EER are the enigmatically ‘lived’ practices of educative experience (human-culture actions and felt other-than-human-Nature interactions). Ecological experiences within experiential and interdisciplinary EE curriculum are inadequately researched in relation to action. Forty-five years after Tbilisi, the power and promise of its “Recommendations” are re-sounded. Tbilisi’s potentials to reconstruct mainstream education policy have been muted for the past two decades of EER. Evidence-driven critical histories of the praxis of key Tbilisi principles are needed if the narrative continuity of the field is to be radically reclaimed.

Environmental education in Aotearoa New Zealand: reconfiguring possum–child mortal relations

ABSTRACT In Aotearoa New Zealand children learn about biodiversity loss and protection through a bicultural environmental education (EE) program. Connected with Predator Free NZ, a nationwide restoration project, the program teaches children about killing possums, rats, and stoats. Children’s involvement in possum killing has a long, troubling history in Aotearoa and EE is now working to transform attitudes from ‘hating possums’ into respecting all animals. This paper analysis the recent shift in rhetoric, with a focus on the discord between animal rights scholars and EE and by addressing the histories of Aotearoa, possums, and EE. With the help of Donna Haraway, Rangimārie Rose Pere, and other indigenous scholars, the troubles obscuring the move into interspecies respect are made visible. Militarized discourse, war games, individualism, Restoration, nature-culture divide, and human exceptionalism, are all emphasized as barriers. This paper also draws attention to a major concern with possum-child worlds and EE research in that children’s voice is seriously lacking. It is then argued that children’s stories must be present in future EE research, and that the pathway toward respecting possums is one and the same, located in indigenous, interspecies, children’s, and ecofeminist stories. Positions that emphasize interconnected ecologies between people, place, and animals.