"Education is not a preparation for life; education is life itself." - John Dewey "The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet." - Aristotle "The highest education is that which doesn't merely give us information but makes our life in harmony with all existence." - Rabindranath Tagore "It is the lot of man to share in the deeper aspirations of the universe around him and to share his own destiny as well as that of the universe, now by adjusting himself to its forces, now by putting the whole of his energy to his own ends and purposes." - Sir Muhammad Iqbal (RA) Image NEW JKPSC Assistant Professor Previous Year Papers PDF | NEW Syllabus for the post of Assistant Professor Renewable Energy in Higher Education Department published by JKPSC | NEW Syllabus for Post of Assistant professor in Environmental science JKPSC - 2023 in Higher Education Department | NEW Top 10 questions of Environmental Science in 2023-2024

WHAT IS ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION?

 

WHAT IS ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION?

Environmental education may best be defined as a process directed at creating awareness and understanding about environmental issues that leads to responsible individual and group actions. Successful environmental education focuses on processes that promote critical thinking, problem solving, and effective decision-making skills. Environmental education utilizes processes that involve students in observing, measuring, classifying, experimenting, and other data gathering techniques. These processes assist students in discussing, inferring, predicting, and interpreting data about environmental issues.

 

Environmental education offers the long-term solu­tion to environmental problems. The World Conservation Strategy (IUCN, 1980) has emphasized that a new ethic must be developed in which humankind lives in harmony with the natural world. Formal edu­cation provides an obvious route through which this can be achieved.

There have been several impressive efforts to pro­mote environmental studies at primary, secondary, and tertiary levels (e.g. Chase, 1990; Foster-Smith, 1990; Nowell and Hollister, 1990). The impact of environmental education programmes for young people will not, however, be immediate because there is an inevitable time lag before the children or stu­dents, who are being educated, are in planning or decision-making roles. A further concern is that the single subject approach at secondary and tertiary lev­els inhibits the introduction of cross-curriculum teach­ing of the kind needed in environmental education.

 

WHAT IS QUALITY ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION?

 

1 Fairness and accuracy: EE materials should be fair and accurate in describing environmental problems, issues, and conditions, and in reflecting the diversity of perspectives on them.

Factual accuracy

Balanced presentation of differing viewpoints and theories

Openness to inquiry

Reflection of diversity

 

2 Depth: EE materials should foster awareness of the natural and built environment, and an understanding of environmental concepts, conditions, and issues, and an awareness of the feelings, values, attitudes, and perceptions at the heart of environmental issues, as appropriate for different developmental levels.

Awareness

Focus on concepts

Concepts in context

Attention to different scales

 

3 Emphasis on skills building: EE materials should build lifelong skills that enable learners to prevent and address environmental issues.

Critical and creative thinking

Applying skills to issues

Action skills

 

4 Action orientation: EE materials should promote civic responsibility, encouraging learners to use their knowledge, personal skills, and assessments of environmental issues as a basis for environmental problem solving and action.

Sense of personal stake and responsibility

Self-efficacy

 

5 Instructional soundness: EE materials should rely on instructional techniques that create an effective learning environment.

Learner-centered instruction

Different ways of learning

Connection to learners' everyday lives

Expanded learning environment  

Interdisciplinary

Goals and objectives

Appropriateness for specific learning settings

Assessment

 

6 Usability: EE materials should be well designed and easy to use.

Clarity and logic

Easy to use

Long lived

Adaptable

Accompanied by instruction and support

Make substantiated claims

Fit with national, state, or local requirements

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