This longitudinal study has examined an Australian primary school's change processes as it has striven to transcend government-mandated environmental education in New South Wales. Woodridge Primary School initiated "Environment Woodridge", a comprehensive reform effort, in March of 2003. Since then the staff have worked to integrate programmatic, concept-based, experiential environmental learning throughout core curriculum.Eight years of change processes have been examined through three visits to the school over the span of three years. Woodridge Primary School is a friendly place where collaborative decision-making has paved the way for many successful initiatives bringing the school much recognition. The school's dedicated teachers, who have proven themselves skilled change agents, together with an enthusiastic and driven principal, have a definite vision for their school. Beyond manifesting a caring atmosphere where technology and the environment are major foci, the Woodridge staff has worked to maintain their identity as a unique and progressive school.Several researchers feel that the application of ecological understandings to school change processes will bring more fruitful reform efforts (Cooper, 1993, Fullan, 1997, Sarason, 1971, Selby, 2000). This research offers a new ecological framework for examining school culture and change processes. The interaction of energy flow, the cycling of mater, interrelationships, and change allow a natural system to flourish. Thus, these concepts were applied to the study of this school.Earthkeepers, the first program to be implemented in the Environment Woodridge reform effort, received tremendous support and created quite a buzz among the community when it was initiated in 2003. However, in 2006, energy surrounding the program had dissipated, the principal was the only member of the staff driving the program, and curricular integration and application of Earthkeepers concepts was falling away. The ripple effects caused by a government-mandated reform had thwarted Earthkeepers curricular integration. Further, Woodridge teachers felt that the increasing pressure of mandated reforms had made it difficult for them to maintain their own vision of the school. This research offers an in-depth examination of how a successful school has dealt with the impacts of mandated monoculture.

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The central argument underlying this research is that experiential learning (EL) can strengthen environmental university programs. Its goal is to demonstrate the benefits of EL from students' and graduates' perspectives and to provide recommendations for its effective implementation into a program. The research utilized a qualitative case study (Environmental Sciences/Studies (ESS) programs at the University of Manitoba, Canada) through focus groups and individual interviews with students and graduates. The results indicate that EL helps develop an understanding of environmental complexities; motivates students to engage at all levels of their ability; is decisive in skill development; engages students in environmental issues with diverse stakeholders; is important in obtaining employment; and it is imperative to connect EL activities to concepts taught in class. The data however, did not show EL to be a significant factor in fostering pro-environmental behaviours in post-secondary environmental students. Overall, the research shows that provided effective implementation, EL can play a significant role in enhancing ESS curriculum and that ESS students place a great value on EL in their education. / October 2016

The goal of this study is to develop an understanding of how participants express their environmental identities during an environmental learning program. Past research on the outcomes of environmental learning programs has focused primarily on changes in knowledge and attitudes. However, even if knowledge or attitudes can be accurately measured, they do not necessarily directly predict outcomes of environmental learning programs but rather serve as a proxy. Environmental identity is proposed as an alternative way to understanding participants' experiences in an environmental learning program. This study borrows a theoretical framework for environmental identity from the field of environmental campaigning and applies the field of environmental learning in a new way. This framework is based on known aspects of human identity from psychological research and allows environmental identity to be explored in a new and unique manner. A thematic analysis approach allows for the description of how six middle school students express their environmental identities around the themes of values and life goals, group membership, and fears and threats related to environmental issues. Findings indicate that the environmental identities of the participants in this study appear to be continuously developing and changing to account for new experiences and ideas related to the environment. Over the course of the program, some of the participants expressed that their environmental identities had strengthened due to their participation in the environmental learning program. The theoretical framework is used to describe what a strong environmental identity would look like as well as to characterize three of the participants' environmental identities. The affordances and limitations of the framework are shared and suggestions are made for how the framework could be strengthened for use in understanding participants' environmental identities during environmental learning programs.

Integrating environmental learning into mainstream education is an important countermeasure to address the challenges to the sustainability of the earth and children's integrated development. To be effectively integrated into mainstream education, an environmental learning program should be designed in ways that elicit the support of stakeholders, while at the same time without scarifying the environmental learning goals. The purpose of this study therefore is to explore an environmental learning model that meets the above mentioned goal using a case study design.Key principles for designing such environmental learning programs are identified first based on the theoretical framework. Then, the actual enactment of these principles in a practical setting and the effects on students in terms of environmental learning goals and traditional educational goals are explored through a case study of a pilot environmental learning program designed with these guiding principles. It presents a detailed portrait of the design process, the actual enacted curriculum, and the experiences of key stakeholders with this environmental learning program. It also evaluates this program's effects on students in environmental literacy (the environmental learning goal), academic achievement and social development (the traditional educational goals). The enactment of the guiding principles and factors that influence the enactment of this program are discussed thereafter. It concludes with the construction of the curriculum integration through environmental learning model based on the case study and a discussion of the model in light of the curriculum integration framework.

South Africa has recently introduced a new curriculum – curriculum 2005 and its revised version, the Revised National Curriculum Statement to replace the pre-apartheid education curriculum. C-2005 had come with some major changes in the teaching and learning of most subjects in the school curriculum. Among its major changes, the new curriculum focused on Environmental Education (EE) as a theme to be offered across the entire basic education or General Education and Training (GET) level curriculum. The one implication of that new focus on Environmental Education was that all the children at the basic education level were to be introduced to EE concepts and content. While the new version of C-2005, in the form of the RNCS places arguably less focus on Environmental Education as a theme, it retains the focus on environmental learning through (for example) the first principle listed for the RNCS: “Social justice, a healthy environment, human rights and inclusively.” Furthermore, a number of learning area outcomes with an environmental focus have also been retained. The whole focus on environmental learning, whether as a principle or a theme, is an unprecedented change in the curriculum of South Africa. Not many teachers, policymakers, learners, and other education stakeholders however, have the necessary experience to make such a major focus on Environmental learning workable within the current provincial systems of the country. It is against this background that a research was initiated to find out how the various provinces have responded to this new curriculum focus on EE. The study sought to explore the distribution of Environmental Education Opportunities to learn in the Mpumalanga province. Data for the study were collected mainly through qualitative interviews and document analysis with Environmental Education coordinator, subject advisers and the subject teachers within the province. An important finding in the study among others is that the Mpumalanga Education Department (MDE) on its own appears to have limited intellectual and material resources with which to build the schools’ instructional capacity for the implementation of the new Environmental Education policies and programs. I concluded the study by positing possible approach for providing Opportunities to Learn Environmental Education through an interaction between governmental and non-governmental resources and programmes in Mpumalanga. / Dissertation (MEd (Curriculum and Instructional Design and Development))--University of Pretoria, 2008. / Curriculum Studies / unrestricted

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of North Texas, May, 2007. / Title from title page display. Includes bibliographical references.

In line with international developments, the Department of Education in South Africa (SA) recognises environmental education as a key vehicle to respond to the national and global environmental crisis (DoE, 2001, P. 3). For this reason, the post-1994 education provision sought to infuse environmental education into the new curriculum called Curriculum 2005. The White Paper on Education and Training (RSA, 1995) perceived environmental education as a means to a better quality of life for all people and argued that it should be integrated at all levels of the SA Education and Training system. The White Paper further stated that “environmental education, involving an inter-disciplinary, integrated and active approach to learning, must be a vital element of all levels and programmes of the education and training system, in order to create environmentally literate and active citizens and ensure that all South Africans, present and future, enjoy a decent quality of life through the sustainable use of resources” (RSA, 1995, P. 22). How have the schools responded to this challenge by the new integration policy? How is the environmental learning provided for in the primary school curriculum across SA? What resources exist to make environmental policy workable in schools, and how are these resources mobilised and organised to promote learning? These and other questions formed the basis for the present inquiry An Opportunity to Learn (OTL) study was conducted to explore how one primary school in SA provides OTL about the environment. The main aim of the study was to understand the manner in which teachers integrate environmental learning in the school curriculum. A qualitative research approach was used as a mode of inquiry for this study. Interviews, classroom observations and document analysis were used as data collection methods. The findings of the study suggest that Sechaba Primary School has managed to integrate environmental learning in its curriculum through the help of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and other stakeholders. The research concluded by arguing that OTL about the environment appear to be enhanced where there are strong connections between the schools and NGOs. Specifically, the following set of recommendations was documented: First, local leadership and agency are required to pursue the various opportunities and resources to build the school’s capacity for environmental learning. Schools should be encouraged to designate and support local leaders to take responsibility for driving the integration of environmental learning into their curriculum. Such integration is too important and maybe too demanding to be left to individual teachers independently in their own classrooms. Second, converting the latent capacity and/or physical and intellectual infrastructure for environmental learning into real OTL about the environment for the students will continue to remain a challenge for some of the teachers while others have managed the integration in some exemplary fashion. Opportunities for teachers to observe each other, plan together and work collaboratively on issues of integration should be created at school and district level. Third, it is critical that all teachers undergo in service training regarding the implementation of environmental education, and such training should provide teachers with enough time to learn. One of the major limitations of the Department of Education’s programme of implementation of the new environmental learning policy has been the inability to provide teachers with enough time to learn and implement the new ideas of the revised national curriculum statement. Finally, it is important to reiterate the importance of providing adequate resources for implementation of environmental learning from the Department of Education. Having said that, however, the case of Sechaba has demonstrated how such resources can also be mobilised from elsewhere outside the system. Encouraging beneficial partnerships between schools and NGOs may in itself be a valuable resource to encourage many primary schools in SA for whom government resources in this field continue to remain inadequate. / Dissertation (MEd (Curriculum and Instructional Design and Development))--University of Pretoria, 2008. / Curriculum Studies / unrestricted

AbstractOutdoor education is a concept of the idea where you teach matters. This study asks the question of what significance outdoor education has for learning in natural science and how motivation influence the learning of the students.For young students in natural science it is important that they have the possibility to vary their environmental setting to be able to get firsthand and authentic experiences of life, nature, society and culture in its natural place, so that they can use that in their early education. A variety of how the students learn should mix between literal- and sense-based learning. Several of the studies that we have researched shows the same thing, outdoor education has an impact on the knowledge and skillset within natural science for the students. Yet it is rarely used to the extent that maybe it should within education. It does however not stop there; outside education also motivates students to learn both in the outside and inside settings.

Small-scale fisheries are learning contexts of importance for generating, transferring, and updating ecological knowledge of natural environments through everyday work practices. The rich knowledge fishers have of local ecosystems is the result of the intimate relationship fishing communities have had with their natural environments across generations (see e.g. Urquhart and Acott 2013). This relationship develops strong emotional bonds to the physical and social place. For fishing communities and fishers – who depend directly on local ecosystems to maintain their livelihoods – fishing environments are natural places for living, working and defining themselves. Previous research on fishers’ ecological knowledge has mainly been descriptive, i.e., has focused on aspects such as reproduction, nutrition and spatial-temporal distribution and population dynamics, from a traditional view of knowledge that only recognises scientific knowledge as the true knowledge. By doing this, fishers’ ecological knowledge has been investigated separately from the learning contexts in which it is generated, ignoring the influence of social, cultural and historical aspects that characterise fishing communities, and the complex relationships between fishers and the natural environments they live and work in. This thesis investigates ecological knowledge among small-scale fishers living and working in the ecosystems of Lake Vättern and the Blekinge Archipelago (Baltic Sea) in Sweden and explores how ecological knowledge is generated with particular regard to the influences of work and nature on fishers’ knowledge of ecosystems. The aim of this thesis is to contribute to the knowledge and understanding of informal learning processes of ecosystem complexity among small-scale fishers. This knowledge further contributes to the research field of ecological knowledge and sustainable use and management of natural resources. It addresses the particular research questions of what ecological knowledge fishers generate, and how its generation is influenced by their fishing work practices and relationships to nature. The thesis consists of three articles. Article I focuses on the need to address the significant lack of theoretical and methodological frameworks for the investigation of the cognitive aspects involved in the generation of ecological knowledge. Article II deals with the need to develop theoretical, methodological and empirical frameworks that avoid romanticising and idealising users’ ecological knowledge in local (LEK), indigenous (IEK) and traditional (TEK) ecological knowledge research, by rethinking it as being generated through work practices. Article III addresses the lack of studies that explicitly explore theories linking complex relations and knowledge that humans form within and of ecosystems. It also addressed the lack of attention from environmental education researchers to theory and empirical studies of ‘sense of place’ research, with a particular focus on environmental learning. Research into the question of what ecological knowledge fishers generate shows differences in their ways of knowing ecosystem complexity. These differences are explained in terms of the influences of the species being fished, and the sociocultural contexts distinguishing fishers’ connection to the fishing profession (i.e., familial tradition or entrepreneurship) (Article I), but also by the fishing strategies used (Article II). Results answering the research question of how work practices influence fishers’ knowledge of ecosystem complexity show a way of rethinking their ecological knowledge as generated in a continuous process of work (Article II), thus, far from romantic views of knowledge. Results answering the research question of how fishers’ relationships to nature influence their knowledge of ecosystem complexity demonstrate the complex interconnections between psychological processes such as identity construction, proximity maintenance and attachment to natural environments (Article III). Finally, more similarities than differences between fishers’ knowledge were found, despite the variation in cases chosen, with regards to landscape, target species, regulations systems and management strategies, fishing environments scales, as well as cultural and social contexts. / <p>At the time of the doctoral defense, the following paper was unpublished and had a status as follows: Paper 2: Manuscript.</p><p> </p> / Ecological knowledge and sustainable resource management: The role of knowledge acquisition in enhancing the adaptive capacity of co-management arrangements