The purpose of this study was to measure whether an after-school environmental education program based on modified Project Wild materials, positively impacted third graders environmental knowledge, attitudes and behavioral intentions. Eight lesson plans were developed, piloted and re-designed over a one year period and then delivered to third graders for a total of eight weeks in a fall semester. The lessons included units on water, air, land, recycling, insects, fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals. A pre-post test retrospective questionnaire was developed to determine changes in the participant's knowledge, attitudes and behavioral intentions as a result of participating in the program. Results indicate positive shifts in knowledge and changes in environmental attitudes and behavioral intentions. Recommendations were also made for future studies.

Solving global environmental problems requires a major change of values. As relates to environmental education, worldview, ethics and spiritual issues are important elements. But how are environmental issues included in such school subjects that especially discuss values and ethics? In this article I examine 24 Finnish religious education and ethics textbooks to analyze, to what extent environmental issues are integrated and discussed in them. I conclude that there is confusion about what environmental education can be in societal school subjects. The environmental texts in textbooks do not always draw on the specific content of the societal subject in question but repeat content from the natural sciences. Therefore, I suggest contexts and perspectives for discussing environmental issues that would comport with these subjects and supplement existing environmental education at school.

This study on engagement in environmental activism can offer valuable insights into how Ontario’s young people come to be responsible stewards of the earth. This research seeks to understand the narrative complexities put forth by teachers and students (Gr. 11-12) about the influence school plays for environmental activists. The teachers’ involvement with activism is mediated by students and the social networks that support their actions. The students’ involvement in action is influenced by teacher mentors, learning about/in the environment, and having a venue for activism. These findings suggest that in order to live up to Acting Today, Shaping Tomorrow schools should be seeking to have at least one environmentally literate teacher who wants to provide students with a venue for action. To assist the teachers and students with activism, there needs to be support for environmental action initiatives from the school administration and the community.

Invasive species are one of many important environmental issues facing Canadians today. A great deal of research has explored both the scientific and social aspects of invasive species. However, the cumulative research has not yet thoroughly explored people’s thoughts and feelings about, or perceptions of, invasive species and the influence these may have on management of, or policy decisions regarding, invasive species. This thesis research project was designed to assess the attitudes and perceptions that high school students have towards invasive species and to determine to what extent learning about invasive species alters their connection with nature. The study group was comprised of students from four Grade 11 Environmental Science classes from three high schools within the city of Guelph, Ontario. The students received regular classroom instruction from their teachers covering the course content, including invasive species. Students also made weekly visits to a local nature centre, providing them with hands-on learning experiences related to the course content. Students responded to an 80-question survey that assessed their knowledge of local invasive species and attitudes towards them as well as students’ connection to nature. Their connection to nature was assessed using a modified version of the Connectedness to Nature Scale (Mayer & Frantz, 2004). The surveys were administered by the classroom teachers in October, 2010, prior to the presentation of instructional material covering invasive species and then again in December, 2010 when the presentation of instructional material concerning invasive species was complete. The results showed that the students’ knowledge of invasive species upon entering the course was quite low and each of the classes witnessed a significant increase in knowledge. The survey results did not reveal any change to the students’ connection to nature; however, they did reveal three underlying themes in students’ attitudes towards invasive species: a concern about invasive species as a threat or problem; feelings of acceptance towards invasive species; and feelings of anxiety about invasive species. These attitudes remained relatively unchanged after the course.

This study on engagement in environmental activism can offer valuable insights into how Ontario’s young people come to be responsible stewards of the earth. This research seeks to understand the narrative complexities put forth by teachers and students (Gr. 11-12) about the influence school plays for environmental activists. The teachers’ involvement with activism is mediated by students and the social networks that support their actions. The students’ involvement in action is influenced by teacher mentors, learning about/in the environment, and having a venue for activism. These findings suggest that in order to live up to Acting Today, Shaping Tomorrow schools should be seeking to have at least one environmentally literate teacher who wants to provide students with a venue for action. To assist the teachers and students with activism, there needs to be support for environmental action initiatives from the school administration and the community.

There has been much written of the potential positive impact in Environmental Education (EE) and Education for Sustainable Development (ESD). This thesis explores the reliance on deliberative democracy by the proponents of EE/ESD and whether or not they have justification for their beliefs. Specifically, participation and deliberation will be separated in order to identify any faults in these values that may prevent democracy – and therefore education – from addressing the problems of sustainable development and environmental concerns. Through a deconstruction of the relevant literature and a clarification of the lines of thought brought forth throughout the various arguments, it is shown that there is no good theoretical or empirical reason for advocating a deliberative democratic approach to EE/ESD as feverishly as some do. Instead, the case for an educational method and content based on the empirically observed characteristics of current liberal democracies will be made.

To promote people's contact with nature is both an environmental and a health issue. Previous studies show that being in natural environments provides mental, physical and emotional health benefits and is significant in the formation of environmental attitudes, which is also known to be important during child development. This study is about the opportunities that children have to experience natural environments within pre-schools in Sao Paulo Municipality (Brazil) considering their pre-school leaders and teachers' perspectives. Through qualitative interviews and text analysis, five kindergartens were studied. One aim has been to get a better understanding of the preschool's official policy on environmental education and a picture of pre-school leaders and preschool teachers' attitudes regarding children's access to nature. The other goal was to investigate the concrete pre-school activities in which children participate, as reported by their pre-school leaders and preschool teachers. The results show that the municipal curriculum recommends interaction with nature through goal-oriented activities, but does not specifically emphasise free play in nature. It has also been shown that pre-school principals and teachers have a positive attitude towards including nature in unstructured as well as structured pre-school activities. However, the degree to which this is reflected in the current activities is strongly dependent on other factors, such as physical,administrative or organizational conditions that exist in each pre-school. These so-called frame factors need to be known and taken into consideration, whether it is the education planners, pre-school leaders or preschool teachers that are trying to implement change. The study also highlights the importance of a work environment that encourages preschool teachers to seek self-development in their professional capacity, which in turn affects the quality of environmental education that is taught.

Formation of voluntary collective action provides a synergy whereby communities can accomplish environmental management improvement. To study this formative process, I asked four research questions:. How does group learning happen and how is it distributed among individuals in a collective?. How does voluntary collective action form, particularly around environmental issues?. What is the relationship between these first two questions?. What themes emerge that might inform communities or environmental managers who wish to promote voluntary collective action in communities?To answer these questions, I conducted a five-year case study of one community during which I observed the teaching and learning process and the formation of voluntary collective action arrangements. Data include over 5000 emails, minutes from 135 community meetings, observations of meetings and community gatherings, documents (bylaws, policies, guidelines, covenants), and 46 personal interviews with community members. I describe the community learning process through four characteristics: a setting in everyday life; a shared and constructed perspective among learners; a context where process is more important than product; and roles that are non-hierarchal and flexible. I propose the term co-facilitated community learning for this learning process, and provide evidence that it played a critical role in the development of voluntary collective agreements. I describe the typical chronology whereby voluntary collective action arrangements were formed in the case study community, and list the major environmental collective action arrangements developed. Many arrangements negotiated and approved by the case study community address significant environmental problems that have proven intransigent to other forms of management such as regulation and financial markets.I name collective action competence as the link between collective awareness and collective behavior change, and define it as the readiness of a group of people to behave towards a common goal based on a collective awareness, and a collective set of skills and experiences.Four themes emerge that might inform those who wish to promote voluntary collective action in communities to improve environmental management: (1) use of consensus-type governance, (2) reducing costs of cooperation, (3) use of normative pressures, and (4) good information communication and reinforcement. / Dissertation

The main purposes of this study are to investigate the environmental literacy of the Kaohsiung City civil servants, their education and training needs, and the correlation between the two. The subjects of this study were civil servants of the Kaohsiung City Government, and data were collected by quantitative research methods. The study was built mainly on the theoretical framework of Hungerford and Volk¡¦s responsible environmental behavior model, and an environmental behavior model consolidated by San-Pui Lam was also consulted, in order to carry out investigation and analysis. Environmental concern was categorized into 5 levels, and general environmental attitude into 4 levels. These two variables were not used to decide the level of environmental literacy. The object of categorization was to provide a reference for environmental education and training. However, having less concern for environmental issues than other issues or placing less emphasis on environmental values than other civil values was considered as an indicator of poor literacy performance. Other variables were categorized into three levels (A, B and C) according to the scores, with A representing the highest level of performance, followed by B representing a medium level of performance, and C representing poor performance. The following conclusions were obtained: 1. In the performance of environmental literacy, more than 75% of the responding Kaohsiung City civil servants had an environmentally friendly attitude, with at least a medium level of environmental knowledge and skills. In the environmental behavior aspect, however, poor performance in behaviors other than ecomanagement was shown. It was evident that the respondents were unable to apply their environmental knowledge, skills and positive attitude, and transform them into active environmental behaviors. 2. With regard to the education and training needs, the study proposed the following benchmarks for strengthening environmental education and training: (1) those who had not achieved the high level in terms of the scores of environmental knowledge, skills and behaviors; (2) those who had less concern for, or placed less emphasis on, environmental issues or values than other issues or civil values. Test results showed that 25% of the responding Kaohsiung City civil servants had not reached the high level for their knowledge of issues, 66% had not reached the high level for their knowledge of action strategies, and 78% had not reached the high level for their skill in using action strategies. In terms of their self-assessed training needs, 90% of the respondents indicated a high level of need for knowledge, and 85% indicated a high level of need for skills. It showed that respondents¡¦ subjectively-assessed needs for environmental education and training in terms of knowledge and skills were slightly higher than their actual needs for education and training. However, only 20% of the responding civil servants had participated in environmental education and training in the past three years, representing a paradox formed by a high level of needs and a low level of participation. 3. Regarding the difference in environmental literacy of respondents with different backgrounds, it was shown that respondents who had participated in environmental education and training in the past three years generally had better performance in literacy indicators than those who had not, except for these 5 variables: knowledge of issues, knowledge of action strategies, persuation, general environmental attitude, and locus of control. For other backgrounds, it showed no significant difference in the environmental literacy performance. 4. For the difference in environmental education and training needs of respondents with different backgrounds, those who had participated in environmental education and training in the past three years had a higher level of needs than those who had not. Other differences in respondents¡¦ backgrounds made no significant difference in their environmental education and training needs. 5. On the correlation between environmental literacy and environmental education and training needs, 7 variables were shown to be significantly correlated: the knowledge aspect of environmental education and training needs, environmental concern, environmental attitude, general environmental attitude, specific environmental attitude, locus of control, as well as skill in using action strategies. In the aspect of skills, variables that showed significant correlation with environmental literacy were the same as those for the knowledge aspect of training needs, except for general environmental attitude. Finally, recommendations on civil servants¡¦ environmental education and training were made based on the literature review and the study results, to provide a reference for the competent authority of civil servants and the training organizations.

Abstract This study was mainly to explore the different teaching strategies to the effect of Environmental Education. The subjects were three sixth-grade classes of an elementary school in Kaohsiung. The experimental group was implemented Critical e-STSE teaching (Critical Thinking and Web Quest Information Tool were integrated into e-STSE teaching), the control group one was implemented Critical Thinking integrated in lecture teaching, and the control group two was implemented e-STSE teaching (Web Quest Information Tool was integrated in e-STSE teaching), conducting Environmental Education based on the Issues of Petrochemical Industrial Park. The teaching effects were analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively. On the aspect of quantity, the pretest and posttest of Environmental Education Sub-target Questionnaire of students¡¦ grades were evaluated and analyzed by ANCOVA for the learning differences of three groups. On the aspect of quality, the students¡¦ discussions of K12 issues, learning sheets and tasks of Web Quest were analyzed. In addition, the kids¡¦ feedback forms, interviews and teachers¡¦ journals were analyzed. The results based on the analysis were as below: 1. Three different groups all had significant results on the students¡¦ Environmental Education Performances. 2. Web Quest teaching design promoted the two groups-Critical e-STSE teaching and e-STSE teaching-on the learning results of the Educational Awareness and Sensitivity, and the Educational Action Skills, better than Critical Lecturing Teaching group. 3. Critical Thinking teaching activities promoted the two groups-the Critical e-STSE teaching and Critical lecture teaching- on the learning results of the Educational Ethical values, better than the e-STSE teaching group. 4. Critical Thinking and Web Quest Informational Tool integrated in e-STSE Environmental Educational Program promoted students¡¦ learning interests and abilities to the Science and Environmental Education. 5. Web Quest teaching design combined with K12 network classroom enhanced students¡¦ autonomous learning abilities and motivations. 6. The Curriculum design of games and group cooperation enhanced students¡¦ learning outcomes. 7. Field study and Observation were suited to apply to the Critical Thinking and Web Quest Informational Tool integrated to e-STSE Environmental Educational Program. Finally, based on the results, the researcher make recommendations on the future teaching design and implement, and the further relevant study direction. Keywords¡GCritical Thinking¡BWeb Quest¡BSTSE¡BInformation Education¡BEnvironmental Education