Educating Science Teachers for Sustainability

Educating Science Teachers for Sustainability
Author: Susan K. Stratton
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 483
Release: 2015-06-18
Genre: Science
ISBN: 3319164112

This volume contains a unique compilation of research and reflections representing multiple vantage points stemming from different parts of the world that can help science educators and teacher educators in finding ways to meaningfully and purposefully embed sustainability into teaching and learning. It is a rich resource for exploring and contextualizing sustainability-oriented science education. At this time we find ourselves in a situation in which the earth’s ecological system is under significant strain as a result of human activity. In the developed world people are asking “How can we maintain our current standard of living?” while those in the developing world are asking “How can we increase the quality of our lives?” all while trying to do what is necessary to mitigate the environmental problems. This volume responds to these questions with a focus on educating for sustainability, including historical and philosophical analyses, and pedagogical and practical applications in the context of science teacher preparation. Included are many examples of ways to educate science teachers for sustainability from authors across the globe. This text argues that issues of sustainability are increasingly important to our natural world, built world, national and international economics and of course the political world. The ideas presented in the book provide examples for original, effective and necessary changes for envisioning educating science teachers for sustainability that will inform policy makers.

Science, Society and Sustainability

Science, Society and Sustainability
Author: Donald Gray
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 271
Release: 2010-09-28
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1135843724

Recent work in science and technological studies has provided a clearer understanding of the way in which science functions in society and the interconnectedness among different strands of science, policy, economy and environment. It is well acknowledged that a different way of thinking is required in order to address problems facing the global community, particularly in relation to issues of risk and uncertainty, which affect humanity as a whole. However, approaches to education in science tend to perpetuate an outmoded way of thinking that is incommensurable with preparing individuals for participation and decision-making in an uncertain, complex world. Drawing on experiences of interdisciplinary dialogue and practice in a higher education context, this book illustrates how reformulating the agenda in science and technology can have a revolutionary impact on learning and teaching in the classroom at all levels. This exceptional study will interest scholars in Education, Science, Technology, and Society, and those looking to further deliberative democracy and civic participation in their students.

Teaching Sustainable Development Goals in Science Education

Teaching Sustainable Development Goals in Science Education
Author: Kerstin Kremer
Publisher: Mdpi AG
Total Pages: 306
Release: 2021-10-18
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9783036515571

At the core of the Agenda 2030 are 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The aim of the SDGs is to secure a sustainable, peaceful, prosperous and equitable life on Earth for everyone now and in the future. To achieve the SDGs, education for sustainable development (ESD) aims to develop competencies that empower individuals to reflect on their own actions, taking into account their current and future social, cultural, economic and environmental impacts, from a local and a global perspective. Therefore, ESD must define new knowledge, skills, values and attitudes and evaluate effective ways towards a new pedagogy. This Special Issue focuses on empirical educational research and theoretical considerations that address transformational competences in science education in the context of the SDGs. It presents new pedagogical approaches that aim to empower learners and teachers to contribute to a sustainable future and to evaluate their effectiveness in science education. Papers can focus on, e.g., new curricula or textbooks, teacher education, classroom and informal learning, whole-institution approaches, action-oriented and transformative learning approaches in science education.

Transformative Science Teaching

Transformative Science Teaching
Author: Daniel Morales-Doyle
Publisher: Harvard Education Press
Total Pages: 179
Release: 2024-05-23
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1682538753

A call to action championing equity and social justice in K–12 science curriculum

The Inclusion of Environmental Education in Science Teacher Education

The Inclusion of Environmental Education in Science Teacher Education
Author: Alec Bodzin
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 379
Release: 2010-08-13
Genre: Education
ISBN: 9048192226

In the coming decades, the general public will be required ever more often to understand complex environmental issues, evaluate proposed environmental plans, and understand how individual decisions affect the environment at local to global scales. Thus it is of fundamental importance to ensure that higher quality education about these ecological issues raises the environmental literacy of the general public. In order to achieve this, teachers need to be trained as well as classroom practice enhanced. This volume focuses on the integration of environmental education into science teacher education. The book begins by providing readers with foundational knowledge of environmental education as it applies to the discipline of science education. It relates the historical and philosophical underpinnings of EE, as well as current trends in the subject that relate to science teacher education. Later chapters examine the pedagogical practices of environmental education in the context of science teacher education. Case studies of environmental education teaching and learning strategies in science teacher education, and instructional practices in K-12 science classrooms, are included. This book shares knowledge and ideas about environmental education pedagogy and serves as a reliable guide for both science teacher educators and K-12 science educators who wish to insert environmental education into science teacher education. Coverage includes everything from the methods employed in summer camps to the use of podcasting as a pedagogical aid. Studies have shown that schools that do manage to incorporate EE into their teaching programs demonstrate significant growth in student achievement as well as improved student behavior. This text argues that the multidisciplinary nature of environmental education itself requires problem-solving, critical thinking and literacy skills that benefit students’ work right across the curriculum.

Looking to the Future

Looking to the Future
Author: Derek Hodson
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 414
Release: 2011-10-25
Genre: Education
ISBN: 9460914721

In advocating an action-oriented and issues-based curriculum, this book takes the position that a major, but shamefully neglected, goal of science and technology education is to equip students with the knowledge, skills, attitudes and values to confront the complex and often ill-defined socioscientific issues they encounter in daily life as citizens in an increasingly technology-dominated world carefully, critically, confidently and responsibly. In outlining proposals for addressing socioscientific issues through a curriculum organized in terms of four increasingly sophisticated levels of consideration, the author adopts a highly critical and politicized stance towards the norms and values that underpin both scientific and technological development and contemporary scientific, engineering and medical practice, criticizes mainstream STS and STSE education for adopting a superficial, politically naïve and, hence, educationally ineffective approach to consideration of socioscientific issues, takes the view that environmental problems are social problems occasioned by the values that underpin the ways in which we choose to live, and urges teachers to encourage students to reach their own views through debate and argument about where they stand on major socioscientific issues, including the moral-ethical issues they often raise. More controversially, the author argues that if students are to become responsible and politically active citizens, the curriculum needs to provide opportunities for them to experience and learn from sociopolitical action. The relative merits of direct and indirect action are addressed, notions of learning about action, learning through action and learning from action are developed, and a case is made for compiling a user-friendly database reflecting on both successful and less successful action-oriented curriculum initiatives. Finally, the book considers some of the important teacher education issues raised by this radically new approach to teaching and learning science and technology. The book is intended primarily for teachers and student teachers of science, technology and environmental education, graduate students and researchers in education, teacher educators, curriculum developers and those responsible for educational policy. The author is Emeritus Professor of Science Education at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (University of Toronto), Adjunct Professor of Science Education at the University of Auckland and Visiting Professor of Science Education at the University of Hong Kong. His research interests include considerations in the history, philosophy and sociology of science and their implications for science and technology education, STSE education and the politicization of both students and teachers, science curriculum history, multicultural and antiracist education, and teacher education via action research.

Educating for Sustainability

Educating for Sustainability
Author: Victor Nolet
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 253
Release: 2015-08-14
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1317962559

Educating for Sustainability presents fundamental principles, theoretical foundations, and practical suggestions for integrating education for sustainability into existing schoolwide systems and programs, organized in three sections: Principles of Education for Sustainability; Fostering a Sustainability Worldview; Learning and Thinking for Sustainability. Designed for teachers and teachers-to-be at all grade levels and across the content areas, the focus is on professional practices and pedagogical approaches rather than specific topics often associated with sustainability. Each chapter includes a number of supports to help readers monitor and improve their own professional practice and to deepen their own sustainability wordview, including textboxes in most chapters that provide more detailed or specialized information and a range of application exercises. All chapters include several "Consider This" activities and an "Extend Your Professional Knowledge" feature. Directly grounded in K-12 classroom practice, this book presents useful and realistic information for teachers looking to reorient their work toward sustainability and help their students develop new thinking and problem-solving abilities.

Issues in Teaching and Learning of Education for Sustainability

Issues in Teaching and Learning of Education for Sustainability
Author: Chew-Hung Chang
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 200
Release: 2019-09-25
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0429833695

In a fast-changing, globalising world, the teaching and implementation of a curriculum for Education for Sustainability (EfS) has been a challenge for many teachers. Issues in Teaching and Learning of Education for Sustainability highlights the issues and challenges educators and academics face in implementing EfS and gives examples of what an EfS curriculum may look like and how some institutions translate the theory into practice. Organised into three parts, the volume looks at: the who (EfS for whom), the what (EfS curriculum) and the how (translating from theory to practice). The concluding chapter provides ideas and directions on where the world can proceed regarding sustainability education and how it can help in the teaching and learning of sustainability. Considering social issues such as poverty, education, health, culture and the use of natural resources, this book proposes a different path towards Education for Sustainability. Providing concrete data on the realisation of sustainable development, Issues in Teaching and Learning of Education for Sustainability will be of interest to geographers, geography educators and professionals concerned with Education for Sustainability.

Education for a Sustainable Future

Education for a Sustainable Future
Author: Keith A. Wheeler
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 306
Release: 2012-12-06
Genre: Science
ISBN: 1461542774

This book illustrates how sustainability, information technologies, and envisioning the future can be effectively woven into an integrated educational experience. By understanding what it takes to build a sustainable community, students will develop the skills needed to engage successfully in a sustainable society. Using the real world as their classroom, they will participate in gathering and analyzing data, clarifying values, listening, speaking, thinking creatively, and making decisions about their community.