There is no abstract available for this thesis.

There is no abstract available for this thesis.

The objective of this thesis is to analyze children’s meaning making processes in science related to environment and sustainability at the pre-school level. This thesis examines an approach to early childhood education which is conceptualized by an explorative as well as a listening approach that specifically addresses children’s questions. The purpose is to create knowledge on how the processes develop and what specific science related content that emerges. All studies are based on a Deweyan pragmatic perspective. Study 1 “logs in” to the debate on children’s possibilities to become “agents for change” and contributing to positive changes for the environment. The results reveal that the children’s positive and negative aesthetic utterances have significance for how the process develops and is being fulfilled. The contextual aspects are imperative both for the content and for the choices the children make along the course of actions. Study 2 examines children exploring animals in a pre-school project concerning biodiversity.  Initially, the results reveal that the organisms’ appearances and movements received morphological and physiological explanations. Further on, knowledge was gained in a manner which has similarities to ecological and evolutionary ways of explaining biological phenomena. Study 3 takes departure from the discussion on the fact that sustainability related problems often are unstructured, multifaceted and conceptualized as “wicked”. The study examines how the process of imagination comes into play when children explore a sustainability related problem that is important to them. The results reveal that creative solutions come into existence when blending various experiences.  Study 4 investigates how children raise and answer science related questions by non-verbal actions. The results expose that non-verbal actions serve as inquiry, comparative systematics, visualization, question-generators as well as a public and self-reflective communication. / <p>At the time of the doctoral defense, the following papers were unpublished and had a status as follows: Paper 2: In review. Paper 3: In press. Paper 4. Manuscript.</p>

According to Locke and Latham (1990), goal-setting is a powerful motivationa! tool which captivates the individual's attention and sense of effort in pooling all available resources to accomplish a task with accrued determination. Goal-setting has been used successfully in sports and physical activities (Kyllo & Landers, 1995). Positive results have also been realized with low achievers in academic tasks (Bandura & Schunk, 1981). / The purpose of this investigation was to test the effects of goal-setting on basketball free throwing with normally achieving (NA) boys and girls, and with children having learning disabilities (LD), ages 9-13 years. This study also tested the relationship between Perceived Physical Self-Competence (Harter, 1978b) and performance. / Results indicated that the children with LD in the goal-setting group outperformed the control group. However, goal-setting failed to differentiate the performances of NA children. No correlation was established between Perceived Physical Self-competence and the performance of these children. Methodological key points are discussed and suggestions are given for future research with goal-setting and children. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)

The purpose was to develop a valid and reliable survey to determine if physical educators provide students with opportunities for self-determination. It was based on the self-determination model of Wehmeyer et al. (1998) and interviews with four university professors and five physical educators. The survey was sent to 153 physical educators from Montreal and Halifax; a 63.4% return rate resulted. The most frequent aspect of self-determination included in their teaching was the opportunity to "develop a sense of belonging in the class", while "choice-making" was provided least frequently. Class size and inadequate resource material were the most detrimental barriers to self-determination. The temporal stability of the survey was .49 for the elements of self-determination and .84 for barriers to self-determination. Finally four physical education teachers were observed in gymnasium settings, two had scored high on self-determination and two had a low score. Systematic observation techniques revealed that their teaching was consistent with their survey score. It was concluded that the survey had sufficient reliability and validity to warrant further development.

Thesis (MEd (Curriculum Leadership))--University of South Australia, 1997

In this research I explore ways in which teachers and parents can enhance the sustainability agenda to bridge the gap towards sustainability through the creation of caring, democratic, just, ecologically regenerative schools-as-communities. I learned that we can only transform ourselves and not others, therefore to transform the model of experience of schooling and society, we need to transform ourselves, the whole community of the school, towards sustainability. This follows the work of Sterling (2001, 2002a and 2002b) which illustrates that education and society will need to change together in a mutually affirming way, since there is no linear cause-effect relationship. This dissertation focuses on one aspect of the developing field of education for sustainability (EfS). I use radical ecology as the philosophy which supports the vision of community transformation towards sustainability (Orr 2002; Fien 2001; and Sterling 2001). I use the emancipatory research paradigm and detail a participatory epistemology fused with a holistic, constructivist notion of reality, to situate a participative approach which enables important interdisciplinary connections to be made. The research comprises ethnographic research and cooperative inquiry projects that were implemented at two small community schools, as well as reflective practice to develop personal and professional practices of sustainability. Contemporary work in the field of EfS has a cultural understanding of sustainability, which uses four pillars: the biophysical, the social-cultural, the economic and the political. The political pillar is the key organising principle for this research. The research is significant because I develop and build upon Sterling’s (2001) notion of transformative learning for sustainability. I show that participatory structures, procedures and processes are necessary, but not sufficient for a socially transformative school-as-community culture and that socio-ecologically contextualised knowing is transformative knowledge about community sustainability. For people to behave in cooperative ways, they need to develop a practical, reconnective knowledge of cooperation. Likewise, for people to behave in ecologically regenerative ways, they need to develop a practical, reconnective knowledge of ecological reconnection. The research methods of reflective practice and cooperative inquiry are discussed and evaluated as vehicles for transformation towards sustainability. The dissertation thereby assesses their effectiveness in enabling the development of practical knowledge about sustainability. In Australia, over the last decade our federal government has shown little interest in fulfilling its own narrowly defined ecological sustainability policy commitments. In Western Australia, our government has recently launched a comprehensive State Sustainability Strategy however its major weakness is that it has afforded very low significance to education at a time when major international organisations such as UNESCO (2002b) see education as an integral part of sustainability and learning as a key to a sustainable future. Sadly, the State Sustainability Strategy does not recommend a reorientation of the education system towards sustainability, does not incorporate a socially critical view of education, and almost completely overlooks the role of learning in the social task of change towards sustainability. In Western Australia, we urgently need policies and political action for commitment through structural reorientation towards EfS. Even in the face of this, a multi-perspectival, inclusive approach to the development of civil society through devolved, locally-based decision making and action within a school community can facilitate the emergence of learning for sustainability in that community. Even within a context of contradiction, tension and paradox, it is possible for school communities to contribute to sustainability through reconnective transformative learning.

Thesis (M.S.)--Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1989. / Vita. Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 49-55). Also available via the Internet.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Toronto, 2004. / Adviser: Helen Lenskyj.

Thesis (M.Sc.)--Edith Cowan University, 2007. / Submitted to the Faculty of Computing, Health and Science. Includes bibliographical references.