30. Environmental and Sustainability Education Research (ESER)
Paper
Exploring the Interrelatedness of Teaching Approach, Environmental Attitudes and Action Competence Among Secondary School Students in an International Context
Ferenc Mónus1, Jan Cincera2, Alexandra Hengerics-Szabó3, Gergely Rosta4, Dániel Sziva5, Attila Varga6
1University of Debrecen, Hungary; 2Masaryk University, Czech Republic; 3J. Selye University, Slovakia; 4Pázmány Péter Catholic University, Hungary; 5Alapértékek Nonprofit Ltd., Hungary; 6ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Hungary
Presenting Author: Mónus, Ferenc
Education for sustainable development (ESD) gained significant momentum by adopting the Sustainable Development goals (SDGs) of the United Nations (2015). Global acceptance of ESD as an educational priority boosted ESD programs and related international collaborations worldwide. In Hungary the nationwide program of the Sustainability Thematic Week (STW) is announced by the Ministry of Human Capacities each year since 2016 with topics related to the different SDGs. A complex research program linked to the national STW was launched in 2020 to examine Hungarian primary and secondary school students’ environmental awareness. In 2022, PontVelem Ltd., the organizer of the STW and coordinator of the linked research program, initiated and supported a research resting on international cooperation in order to investigate environmental awareness and its shaping factors based on representative samples in three central European countries (Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia).
How pedagogical approach in ESD shapes environmental attitudes, pro-environmental behaviour and action competences is recently gaining more and more interest (Chen & Liu 2020, Sass et al. 2020). Action-oriented and transformative pedagogy promote students to become active participants by understanding and deliberating the causes and effects empower their capability of deliberating the causes and effects, and facilitate to construct visions for finding ellaborated strategies to overcome environmental issues. How specific pedagogical methods (Eames et al. 2006, Lozano et al. 2022) or different pedagogical approaches (Boeve-de Pauw et al. 2015) fit best to these requirements are subject of numerous studies, and still remains a potential fruitful field of environmental education research.
Our research investigates a) how teaching approach (holistic approach to content and pluralistic approach to teaching) in secondary school students is interconnected with their environmental attitudes, pro-environmental behaviour and action competences; b) does the pattern of this interconnectedness differ within the different countries represented in our study.
Methodology, Methods, Research Instruments or Sources UsedA representative survey using CAWI methodology (Cocco & Tuzzi 2013) was conducted in three Central European countries. The questionnaire was adapted from earlier questionnaires applied in the STW linked research program in Hungary (see Berze et al. 2022; Mónus et al. 2022) and in several environmental education related research in the Czech Republic (Cincera et al. 2022). 6500 respondents from the 11th class of secondary schools (age of 16-18 years) fulfilled the survey (N= 1666 in Czech Republic, N= 1392 in Slovakia, and N= 3442 in Hungary). In Hungary and the Czech Republic, a two-stage random sampling procedure was used to first select schools using PPS (Probability Proportional to Size) procedure and then to randomly select a class within the sampled schools to fill in the questionnaire. In Slovakia, all secondary schools received a link to the questionnaire, and the participating class within schools was also randomly selected. The deviation of the samples from the distribution of the population was corrected by multivariate weighting (criteria: region, school type, school owner).
The survey contained 124 questions on the students’ environmental attitudes, pro-environmental behaviour, action competences, teaching approach perceived in their classes, and on their demographic and socioeconomic background. The relevant scales in the presentewd study were the children’s NEP scale (Manoli et al. 2007), adapted versions of the preservation, the utilization and the nature appreciation scales (Cincera et al. 2022) of the 2-MEV scale (Bogner 2018), an adapted version of the self-perceived action competence scale (Olsson et al. 2020), and finally two scales to measure the teaching approach (holistic approach to content and pluralistic approach to teaching; Boeve-de Pauw et al. 2015).
The research was performed according to the APA Ethical Principles and considered the national laws in each country. All questionnaires were anonym, could be started by participants after agreeing an informed consent, and the subsequent identification of participants were not feasible based on the answers. The research was organized by Alapértékek Nonprofit Ltd. in partnership with PontVelem Nonprofit Ltd. (as the organizer of the Hungarian STW), and was supported by the Hungarian Ministry of Human Resources, the National Office for Vocational and Adult Education, the Blue Planet Foundation and the Alliance for Fundamental Rights (Hungary). The fieldwork was conducted by Hungarian polling company Forsense.
Conclusions, Expected Outcomes or FindingsCronbach’s alpha reliabilities of the scales used ranged from 0.59 to 0.86 in the different national samples. Based on the preliminary analyses teaching approach slightly correlated both to environmental attitude and self-perceived action competence (rSp=0.08 – 0.15), and action competence moderately correlated to preservation and appreciation of nature (rSp=0.31 – 0.39), while holistic and pluralistic teaching approaches correlated to a higher extent (rSp=0.51). Further more sophisticated analyses are in progress to assess the effect of demographic variables, school type and country effect on these correlations. Considering national differences in teaching approaches and their respected effects on attitudes and action competences may allow us to draw some relevant consequences on ESD policies.
ReferencesBerze, I. Z., Varga, A., Mónus, F., Néder, K., & Dúll, A. (2022). Measuring Environmental Worldviews: Investigating the Dimensionality of the New Environmental Paradigm Scale for Children in a Large Central European Sample. Sustainability, 14(8), 4595.
Boeve-de Pauw, J., Gericke, N., Olsson, D., & Berglund, T. (2015). The effectiveness of education for sustainable development. Sustainability, 7(11), 15693-15717.
Bogner, F. X. (2018). Environmental values (2-MEV) and appreciation of nature. Sustainability, 10(2), 350.
Chen, S. Y., & Liu, S. Y. (2020). Developing students’ action competence for a sustainable future: A review of educational research. Sustainability, 12(4), 1374.
Cincera, J., Kroufek, R., & Bogner, F. X. (2022). The perceived effect of environmental and sustainability education on environmental literacy of Czech teenagers. Environmental Education Research, 1-18.
Cocco, M., & Tuzzi, A. (2013). New data collection modes for surveys: a comparative analysis of the influence of survey mode on question-wording effects. Quality & quantity, 47, 3135-3152.
Eames, C., Law, B., Barker, M., Iles, H., McKenzie, J., Patterson, R., ... & Wright, A. (2006). Investigating teachers' pedagogical approaches in environmental education that promote students' action competence. Teaching & Learning Research Initiative.
Lozano, R., Barreiro‐Gen, M., D'amato, D., Gago‐Cortes, C., Favi, C., Martins, R., ... & Gladysz, B. (2022). Improving sustainability teaching by grouping and interrelating pedagogical approaches and sustainability competences: Evidence from 15 Worldwide Higher Education Institutions. Sustainable Development.
Manoli, C. C., Johnson, B., & Dunlap, R. E. (2007). Assessing children's environmental worldviews: Modifying and validating the New Ecological Paradigm Scale for use with children. The Journal of Environmental Education, 38(4), 3-13.
Mónus, F., Bacskai, K., Varga, A., Berze, I. Z., Néder, K., & Dúll, A. (2022). Általános-és középiskolás diákok környezettudatosságát meghatározó tényezők a Fenntarthatósági Témahét 2021-es nagymintás vizsgálata alapján. Iskolakultúra, 32(7), 47-68.
Olsson, D., Gericke, N., Sass, W., & Boeve-de Pauw, J. (2020). Self-perceived action competence for sustainability: The theoretical grounding and empirical validation of a novel research instrument. Environmental Education Research, 26(5), 742-760.
UN (2015): Sustainable Development Goals https://sdgs.un.org/goals
Sass, W., Boeve-de Pauw, J., Olsson, D., Gericke, N., De Maeyer, S., & Van Petegem, P. (2020). Redefining action competence: The case of sustainable development. The Journal of Environmental Education, 51(4), 292-305.
30. Environmental and Sustainability Education Research (ESER)
Paper
Problematic Situations in Implementing Locally Relevant Teaching
Malena Lidar1, Katrien Van Poeck2, Eva Lundqvist1, Leif Östman1
1Uppsala University, Sweden; 2Ghent University, Belgium
Presenting Author: Lidar, Malena;
Van Poeck, Katrien
The global sustainability crisis calls for citizens with improved awareness, understanding and ability to take action against threatening challenges in society and in everyday life. Policymakers worldwide take initiatives that call on schools and teachers to contribute to this by implementing environmental and sustainability education (ESE) (e.g. UNESCO, 2017, SDG4, target 4.7). One of the educational innovations that schools are invited to implement, is so-called "open schooling", i.e. educational practices in schools that have an explicit ambition to identify, explore and tackle sustainability problems in the local community. The goal in open schooling is for schools to work in collaboration with local stakeholders, authorities, associations, businesses, etc. to contribute to constructive solutions to sustainability issues. Earlier didactic research has shown how policy-driven innovations can be challenging for teachers because they require a departure from habitual ways of thinking and acting. Many studies in science education have shown that implementation of policy innovations is a very complicated process in relation to for example teachers’ beliefs (see for example Wallace & Priestley 2011). Regarding teachers’ common way of teaching Lidar et al. (2020), for instance, show how the introduction of external examinations in primary school meant that teachers had to re-evaluate their teaching habits and coordinate their teaching to fit the new requirements. In relation to sustainability education Leemans (2022) argues that implementing a ‘whole school approach’, as UNESCO (2021) and governments (e.g. Onderwijsinspectie 2017) call for, challenges everyday routines in a class, school, and local community before such an education innovation can become part of the normal course of events.
In this paper, we identify and discuss several kinds of difficulties that teachers may experience in implementing policy-driven educational innovation through an explorative case study of open schooling practices in Sweden and Belgium. In particular, we investigate how schools implement open schooling through LORET - Locally Relevant Teaching (Östman et al. 2013), a methodology to plan locally relevant sustainable development teaching that is adapted to local needs/conditions while also allowing to teach subject knowledge and realize curriculum objectives. Our object of study is the design processes of teaching in workshops where educational researchers and teachers collaborate to co-produce LORET-based open schooling practices.
The paper is theoretically inspired by transactional theory on sustainability learning (Östman et al. 2019) based on the pragmatist work of John Dewey (1916, 1938) who approaches learning ‘transactionally’ (Dewey & Bentley 1949), i.e. as a consequence of individuals' coordination processes with the physical, social and institutional environment. A transactional learning theory posits that learning occurs in response to a ‘problematic situation’ (Dewey 1929). A problematic situation occur when our habitual ways of thinking and acting is disturbed: when we can’t continue as usual with the activity we are involved in. When encountering a problematic situation, we engage in inquiry through experimentation in order to find a solution, which can result in the acquisition of new knowledge, skills, values, identities, and so on. This process may involve a transformation of habits or the development of new habits. As such, pragmatism’s processual approach to the phases of habit, crisis and creativity that mark human action (Shilling 2008) offers us a useful framework to investigate how didactic innovation involves the disturbance of teaching habits.
Our analysis of the disturbance of teaching habits incited by the introduction of a new open schooling methodology is guided by the following research questions:
- Which problematic situations occur?
- What creates these problematic situations, in other words, which are the habits that are disturbed?
Methodology, Methods, Research Instruments or Sources UsedWe present an explorative qualitative case study of LORET workshops in 5 diverse schools: one Swedish primary school (pupils in year 5 and 6, 11-12 years old, working on the issue of waste and recycling), one Swedish secondary school (students in their first year at the Social Science program, 16-17 years old, working on diverse issues in different groups, e.g. recycling of clothes and inter-generational dialogue on SDGs), one Belgian primary school (pupils from preschool to year 6, 2,5-12 years old working on the issue of sustainable food), and two Belgian secondary schools (one with students in their fourth and fifth year at the STEAM program, 15-17 years old, working on the issues of water and electricity, and one with students in the fourth and sixth year of diverse programs, 15-18 years old, working on the issue of sustainable food). In each location a teacher team with different subject specialties and interests took part. Additionally, a team of facilitators with backgrounds as educational researchers participated in the workshops. One facilitator had the overarching responsibility for leading the workshops in the Swedish schools, another one in the Belgian schools. The meetings took place in person or online (zoom, Teams), were recorded and lasted for between 45-240 minutes. The empirical material was gathered through observations and (individual and group) interviews.
Our strategy of analysis was to first listen to the recordings of observations and interviews and take notes. We identified, on the one hand, problematic situations that became visible as a 'gap' (Wickman and Östman 2002) in the ongoing conversations through for example hesitations, questions, a sigh, disagreement on how to continue, etc. and, on the other hand, problematic situations that were voiced by respondents during the interviews. After each recording we discussed the identified “problematic situations” in teams of at least two researchers. All problematic situations we agreed on were transcribed and analyzed in order to determine how they occurred, i.e. through the disturbance of which teaching habits and customs. Subsequently, determining similarities and differences between the identified problematic situations and discussing these repeatedly with the entire research team resulted in a categorization of 9 types of problematic situations.
Conclusions, Expected Outcomes or FindingsWe identified different types of problematic situations:
1. Difficulties to plan lessons starting from a sustainability challenge
2. A lack of content expertise
3. Difficulties to take the students along in an authentic quest for solutions
4. Difficulties to define and coordinate the roles of teachers and non-school partners
5. Difficulties to create tailor-made lesson plans and teaching materials
6. Difficulties to cope with the workload
7. Organizational issues
8. Difficulties to document lesson plans
9. Difficulties to manage the students’ working process
Even though there were common problematic situations brought about by the introduction of LORET differed considerably across contexts , such as a shared struggle to organize lessons that take students along in an authentic quest for solving the sustainability problem at hand, there were also differences in terms of the occurrence of problematic situations as well as in the sort of habits that were disturbed. These differences were related to different national educational contexts, diverse school culture/organization/policies, variety in individual teachers’ habits, and differences in students’ characteristics (e.g. age).
Our explorative study draws attention to the impact of policy-driven innovations on everyday teaching practices and sheds light on some considerations to take into account when installing or facilitating education innovation initiatives. It shows the importance of flexibility and of facilitators being attentive to differences in the problematic situations that are experienced in order to come up with tailored strategies to overcome these. We also observed how paying attention to how teachers’ and schools’ routines are disturbed can result in making changes in habits and customs so that obstacles can be overcome in case this is considered worthwhile. We hope that this explorative study may inspire future research in this topic to validate the findings and gaining more in-depth insight in, for example, how problematic situations can be overcome.
ReferencesDewey, J. 1916. Democracy and Education. An Introduction into the Philosophy of Education. The Free Press.
Dewey, J. 1938. Experience and Education. Touchstone.
Dewey J., & Bentley, A.F. (1949/1991). Knowing and the known. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press.
Leemans, G. (2022). Schoolvernieuwing voor ‘wicked problems’. Naar een aanpak voor de transformatie van ‘sociale praktijken’ vanuit een ‘whole school approach’. Report, Expertisecentrum Education & Development, UCLL.
Lidar, M., Lundqvist, E., Ryder, J., & Östman, L. (2020). The Transformation of Teaching Habits in Relation to the Introduction of Grading and National Testing in Science Education in Sweden. Research in Science Education. 50,151–173. Doi: 10.1007/s11165-017-9684-5
Onderwijsinspectie 2017. Referentiekader voor onderwijskwaliteit: bronnendocument. Brussel: Vlaams Ministerie van Onderwijs en Vorming, Onderwijsinspectie.
Östman, L., Svanberg S. and Aaro Östman, E. 2013. From Vision to lesson: Education for sustainable development in practice. Stockholm: WWF.
Östman, L., Van Poeck, K. and Öhman, J. 2019. A transactional theory on sustainability learning. In: Van Poeck, K., Östman, L. and Öhman, J. Sustainable Development Teaching: Ethical and Political Challenges. New York: Routledge, 127-139.
Shilling, C. 2008. Changing Bodies. Habit, Crisis and Creativity. Sage Publications Inc, London, Thousand Oaks, New Delhi.
UNESCO, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization 2021. ESD for 2030 toolbox: priority action areas. https://en.unesco.org/themes/education-sustainable-development/toolbox/priorities#paa2
UNESCO, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization 2017. Education for Sustainable Development Goals: Learning Objectives. https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000247444
Wallace, C., & Priestley, M. 2011. Teacher beliefs and the mediation of curriculum innovation in Scotland: a socio-cultural perspective on professional development and change. Journal of Curriculum Studies, 43(3), 357–381.
Wickman, P.O., Östman, L., 2002. Learning as discourse change: A sociocultural mechanism. Science Education, 86, 601-623.
30. Environmental and Sustainability Education Research (ESER)
Paper
Mapping the Enablers and Constraints of Sustainability Education: Narratives of ‘Nightmare Schools’ and ‘Dream Schools’ of Sustainability Education
Anna Lehtonen, Niina Mykrä, Hannu Heikkinen, Terhi Nokkala
University of Jyväskylä, Finland
Presenting Author: Mykrä, Niina;
Heikkinen, Hannu
This presentation is based on the ECF4CLIM project (A European Competence Framework for a Low Carbon Economy and Sustainability through Education), funded by the European Green Deal / Horizon 2020 Programme. ECF4CLIM aims at developing, testing and validating a European Competence Framework for transformational change through a multidisciplinary, transdisciplinary and participatory process. Applying participatory action research (PAR), practitioner research (Heikkinen, deJong & Vanderlinde 2016) and citizen science approaches (Senabre, Perelló, Becker, Bonhoure, Legris & Cigarini 2021), it seeks to empower the educational communities in Finland, Portugal, Romania and Spain to act against climate change and towards sustainable development. The purpose of this paper is to present the results of the narrative analysis of the material generated in the crowdsourcing workshops where teachers, students, education experts and different stakeholders reflect what prevents and/or enables schools to implement sustainability education properly.
The research question of this study is: ‘What constrains and/or enables the implementation of sustainability education in schools?’ To answer to this question, we apply the theory of practice architectures (Kemmis 2022) which seeks to find the preceding factors, or social arrangements which prefigure our practices; in other words, make our social practices possible in the way they happen. These practice architectures consist of (1.) cultural-discursive, (2.) material-economic, and (3.) social-political arrangements which in turn prefigure how practices are constituted through (1.) discourses (‘sayings’), (2.) physical activities and actions (‘doings’), as well as (3.) power relations such as solidarity and loyalty (Kemmis 2022). These different dimensions are intertwined in our everyday practices. This understanding of social practices forms a natural continuum with the methodologies of participatory action research (Kemmis et al. 2015).
Various crowdsourcing practices were applied to outline what tools educators and other stakeholders have for promoting sustainability competences, and what hinders and promotes using them. Several workshops were conducted for various groups of stakeholders, such as teachers, student, experts and for social groups in a vulnerable position which do not usually have a voice in society.
Methodology, Methods, Research Instruments or Sources UsedThe methodologies in the ECF4CLIM project are rooted in the traditions of participatory action research (Kemmis et al. 2015), practitioner research (Heikkinen, deJong & Vanderlinde 2016), narrative research (Heikkinen 2002) and citizen science (Senabre, Perelló, Becker, Bonhoure, Legris & Cigarini 2021). To enable different educational stakeholders to have their voice heard, interactive crowdsourcing workshops were carried out, both online and face-to-face.
The Method of Empathy-Based Stories (MEBS; Wallin, Koro-Ljungberg & Eskola 2019) was applied in the workshops. The participants were asked to imagine, based on their real-life experiences, a day at a ‘nightmare school’ where sustainability education was implemented in the worst possible way. After that, they were asked to imagine one day at a ‘dream school’ where sustainable education was realized in the best possible way. Following questions guided the imagination: What did teachers and students, the principal, other school staff and parents do? Why did they act the way they do? How did the school owner disable or enable sustainability education? How did the surrounding society constrain or enable the work for sustainability in schools? What made all these parties work together – or not? In the workshops, the core elements of the stories were encapsulated in ‘sticky notes’ on an online platform.
The 'narrative analysis' was produced from the material (Heikkinen 2002; Polkinghorne 1998). ‘Narrative analysis’ sought to produce a single, coherent and progressive narrative with a clear plot by synthesizing different forms of data. Applying narrative analysis, the international research team compiled the stories into one narrative of a nightmare school and another narrative of a dream school. This analysis was based on the theory of practice architectures in order to find pre-existing practice arrangements that prefigured practices.
Altogether 31 workshops with 500 participants were organized in four of the partner countries. In this paper, the focus on the research data collected in Finland (14 workshops). Our purpose was to make an in-depth analysis instead of striving for a pan-European generalization. We found that in different countries the enablers and constraints were culturally and socially context-bound and they took shape differently in different countries.
The new stories resulting from this analysis are verified using member checking, through which all participants can comment on the finished report, by accepting, correcting, clarifying, or disagreeing with the interpretation.
Conclusions, Expected Outcomes or FindingsAs our result, we present two narratives, one of the nightmare and dream school. The results are reflected both related to the theory of practice architectures and the draft for sustainability competences (Bianchi, Pisiotis & Cabrera 2022) which will be form the basis for the European Competence Framework for Sustainability which will be developed during the ECF4CLIM project. The findings are compared also with the other frameworks for sustainability competences (e.g., Bianchi 2020; Wiek et al. 2011; 2016; Redman, Wiek & Barth 2021).
The method of empathy-based stories seemed to cultivate imagination and reflections on the constraints and enablers of sustainability education among the workshop participants. The nightmare and dream narratives condense valuable knowledge of the challenges and best practices based on personal experiences and stories heard from others.
The results of narrative analysis enlighten how the success in sustainability education depends on an interconnected system of (1) available infrastructure and resources, (2) participatory culture within the school, (3) priorisation of sustainability and (4) collaboration with the network of relevant stakeholders including maintenance services, municipality and society. Therefore, the dimensions of the theory of practice architectures: material-economic, cultural-discursive and social-political arrangements seem to be relevant in developing sustainability education. Furthermore, the findings indicate that the competences defined in the European Sustainability Competence Framework, are essential in promoting sustainability in education. Additionally, the national context, the local system and lifeworld of the students and teachers need to be considered.
This research provides knowledge for developing guidelines how to succeed in promotion of sustainability competences needed for a sustainable post-carbon Europe.
ReferencesBianchi, G., Pisiotis, U., & Cabrera, M. (2022). JRC Science for policy report. GreenComp. The European sustainability competence framework. Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg, doi:10.2760/13286, JRC128040 https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC128040
Heikkinen, H. (2002). Whatever is Narrative Research? In: Huttunen, R., Heikkinen, H. & Syrjälä, L. (Eds.) Narrative research. Voices of Teachers and Philosophers. Jyväskylä: SoPhi, 13 - 28.
Heikkinen, H. L., de Jong, F. P., & Vanderlinde, R. (2016). What is (good) practitioner research?. Vocations and learning, 9(1), 1-19.
Kemmis, S. (2022). Transforming Practices: Changing the world with the theory of practice architectures. Singapore: Springer. https://link.springer.com/book/9789811689727
Kemmis, S., McTaggart, R., & Nixon, R. (2015). Critical theory and critical participatory action research. The SAGE Handbook of action research, 453-464.
Redman, A., Wiek, A., & Barth, M. (2021). Current practice of assessing students’ sustainability competencies: a review of tools. Sustainability Science, 16(1), 117-135.
Senabre Hidalgo, E., Perelló, J., Becker, F., Bonhoure, I., Legris, M., & Cigarini, A. (2021). Participation and co-creation in citizen science. Chapter 11. In: Vohland K. et al.(Eds). 2021. The Science of Citizen Science. Springer. https://doi. org/10.1007/978-3-030-58278-4. pp: 199-218.
Wallin, A., Koro-Ljungberg, M., & Eskola, J. (2019). The method of empathy-based stories. International Journal of Research & Method in Education, 42(5), 525-535.
Wiek. A., Bernstein, M., Foley, R., Cohen, M., Forrest, N., Kuzdas, C., Kay, B., & Withycombe Keeler, L. (2016). Operationalising competencies in higher education for sustainable development. In: Barth M., Michelsen G., Rieckmann M., Thomas I. (eds) 2016 Handbook of higher education for sustainable development. Routledge, London, pp 241–260
Wiek, A., Withycombe L, Redman, C.L. (2011). Key competencies in sustainability: a reference framework for academic program development. Sustainability Science 6(2):203–218.
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