This paper critically engages with the concept of development through an analysis of epistemological justice in education for sustainable development (ESD) and presents alternative strategies for adaptation of the concept in the South. Many definitional challenges still surround development studies. The paper draws on the work of Wolfgang Sachs (1999) who asserts that the notion of sustainability has been consumed by development, presenting a view of sustainability which challenges the current and dominant economically driven hegemonic development discourse in which sustainability has become embedded. Further useful perspectives for this paper are offered by Amartya Sen (2001) who refers to development as a form of freedom. Sachs (1999) maintains that global definitions of development cement the dominant hegemonic discourse of the leading North, which has resulted in an obfuscation of the epistemological contribution from the South. The paper argues that, in the integration of congruent and enabling conceptual frameworks, allowing epistemic justice and validating the lived experience of learners through socially responsive pedagogical frameworks, South Africa is beginning to respond to the global environmental crisis. At the core of the paper is the question of whether an African ethical position advances the attainment of sustainability objectives. The paper concludes by positing a shift in scholastic and social understandings of development, and redefining the term from a changing terrain which may seem immutable with the current environmental crisis. Keywords: Epistemology, development, pedagogy, justice, African ethics
{"title":"Problematising development in sustainability: epistemic justice through an African ethic","authors":"S. Kumalo","doi":"10.4314/SAJEE.V33I1.2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4314/SAJEE.V33I1.2","url":null,"abstract":"This paper critically engages with the concept of development through an analysis of epistemological justice in education for sustainable development (ESD) and presents alternative strategies for adaptation of the concept in the South. Many definitional challenges still surround development studies. The paper draws on the work of Wolfgang Sachs (1999) who asserts that the notion of sustainability has been consumed by development, presenting a view of sustainability which challenges the current and dominant economically driven hegemonic development discourse in which sustainability has become embedded. Further useful perspectives for this paper are offered by Amartya Sen (2001) who refers to development as a form of freedom. Sachs (1999) maintains that global definitions of development cement the dominant hegemonic discourse of the leading North, which has resulted in an obfuscation of the epistemological contribution from the South. The paper argues that, in the integration of congruent and enabling conceptual frameworks, allowing epistemic justice and validating the lived experience of learners through socially responsive pedagogical frameworks, South Africa is beginning to respond to the global environmental crisis. At the core of the paper is the question of whether an African ethical position advances the attainment of sustainability objectives. The paper concludes by positing a shift in scholastic and social understandings of development, and redefining the term from a changing terrain which may seem immutable with the current environmental crisis. Keywords: Epistemology, development, pedagogy, justice, African ethics","PeriodicalId":272843,"journal":{"name":"The Southern African Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"17 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-12-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133797157","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Of all the environmental problems facing humankind today, anthropogenic-induced climate change is regarded as one of the most damaging in its potential repercussions. For this reason, the perceptions of climate change among high-school learners, who represent future decision-makers and stand as a proxy for the next generation, are of importance. This study was designed so as to gain insight into the nature of perceptions and associated determinants among Grade 11 learners in the Tshwane metropolitan municipal area. Specifically, it probed dynamics between the content in the formal curriculum (Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement or CAPS) and learners’ exposure to electronic media, their peers and parents (their arenas of social interaction) in forming these perceptions. The study involved a qualitative analysis of 68 questionnaires completed by learners from two high schools. Findings include misconceptions regarding climate change among learners, as they conflate climate change and the greenhouse effect. The learners’ perceptions seem to be shaped by the cumulative outcomes of dynamics between different arenas of exposure and influence (formal education, peers, parents and the media). It is argued that learners’ perceptions about climate change fostered in formal education should also be understood in the context of their potential exposure to: (1) alarmist framings of climate change in the media; (2) conceptual disagreements in the climate change research community; and (3) the influence of peers and parents. Rather than avoiding the dynamics from contesting and diverging ‘arenas of exposure’, future climate change education planning should accommodate and align contending views that might influence the learning process. Keywords: Climate change, school curriculum, learner perceptions, media, peers
{"title":"Perceptions of climate change among Grade 11 learners in the Tshwane Metropolitan Municipality, South Africa","authors":"Mapaleng Silas Lekgeu, N. Davis","doi":"10.4314/SAJEE.V.33I1.5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4314/SAJEE.V.33I1.5","url":null,"abstract":"Of all the environmental problems facing humankind today, anthropogenic-induced climate change is regarded as one of the most damaging in its potential repercussions. For this reason, the perceptions of climate change among high-school learners, who represent future decision-makers and stand as a proxy for the next generation, are of importance. This study was designed so as to gain insight into the nature of perceptions and associated determinants among Grade 11 learners in the Tshwane metropolitan municipal area. Specifically, it probed dynamics between the content in the formal curriculum (Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement or CAPS) and learners’ exposure to electronic media, their peers and parents (their arenas of social interaction) in forming these perceptions. The study involved a qualitative analysis of 68 questionnaires completed by learners from two high schools. Findings include misconceptions regarding climate change among learners, as they conflate climate change and the greenhouse effect. The learners’ perceptions seem to be shaped by the cumulative outcomes of dynamics between different arenas of exposure and influence (formal education, peers, parents and the media). It is argued that learners’ perceptions about climate change fostered in formal education should also be understood in the context of their potential exposure to: (1) alarmist framings of climate change in the media; (2) conceptual disagreements in the climate change research community; and (3) the influence of peers and parents. Rather than avoiding the dynamics from contesting and diverging ‘arenas of exposure’, future climate change education planning should accommodate and align contending views that might influence the learning process. Keywords: Climate change, school curriculum, learner perceptions, media, peers","PeriodicalId":272843,"journal":{"name":"The Southern African Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"33 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-12-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129744983","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Editorial: Journal Development, Scholar Development and Quality","authors":"Eureta Rosenberg, M. Togo","doi":"10.4314/sajee.v.33i1.1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4314/sajee.v.33i1.1","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":272843,"journal":{"name":"The Southern African Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"10 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-12-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129237349","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2004-12-01DOI: 10.4314/SAJEE.V21I0.122690
J. Hattingh
It may be considered unfair to respond to a paper from the point of view of another discipline, especially if central issues or assumptions in that article are discussed critically. In this paper, comments are made on Alistair Chadwick’s paper from the point of view of philosophy and ethics, but these are offered in the spirit of a constructive dialogue across narrowly conceived disciplinary borders. The general theme of these comments also calls for interdisciplinary dialogue: the language that we use in our debates about environmental education, ethics and action.As such, language is a theme about which every discipline in the social sciences can make a meaningful contribution, and this is what I would like to offer here. In this Viewpoint I will focus on only one issue, namely certain problems that may arise if we accept the language in which Chadwick speaks in his paper about ‘sustainable development’ and ‘values’ respectively. I will raise a number of critical points in this regard, not because there is one and only one appropriate language within which we can discuss our environmental concerns and our (educational) responses to them, but rather because we should be self-consciously aware of the assumptions and implications hidden in the language that we choose to discuss these matters, thus enabling us to disect and evaluate these assumptions and implications with a view to determine to what extent they enhance or undermine our efforts to understand the nature and extent of the environmental challenges that we are faced with.
{"title":"Speaking of Sustainable Development and Values... A Response to Alistair Chadwick's Viewpoint Responding to Destructive Interpersonal Interactions:A way forward for school-based environmental educators","authors":"J. Hattingh","doi":"10.4314/SAJEE.V21I0.122690","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4314/SAJEE.V21I0.122690","url":null,"abstract":"It may be considered unfair to respond to a paper from the point of view of another discipline, especially if central issues or assumptions in that article are discussed critically. In this paper, comments are made on Alistair Chadwick’s paper from the point of view of philosophy and ethics, but these are offered in the spirit of a constructive dialogue across narrowly conceived disciplinary borders. The general theme of these comments also calls for interdisciplinary dialogue: the language that we use in our debates about environmental education, ethics and action.As such, language is a theme about which every discipline in the social sciences can make a meaningful contribution, and this is what I would like to offer here. In this Viewpoint I will focus on only one issue, namely certain problems that may arise if we accept the language in which Chadwick speaks in his paper about ‘sustainable development’ and ‘values’ respectively. I will raise a number of critical points in this regard, not because there is one and only one appropriate language within which we can discuss our environmental concerns and our (educational) responses to them, but rather because we should be self-consciously aware of the assumptions and implications hidden in the language that we choose to discuss these matters, thus enabling us to disect and evaluate these assumptions and implications with a view to determine to what extent they enhance or undermine our efforts to understand the nature and extent of the environmental challenges that we are faced with.","PeriodicalId":272843,"journal":{"name":"The Southern African Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"14 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2004-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"123994318","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1990-12-01DOI: 10.4314/SAJEE.V11I0.137514
Prem Naidoo, J. Kruger, D. Brookes
Environmental education as an agent for environmental problem solving has not produced the anticipated results. It is suggested that this is due to the implementation of environmental education in our present education system which espouses a reductionist and mechanistic epistemology. This epistemology is the underlying cause of environmental problems. What is needed, is a new non-exploitative epistemology; one on which better education is based. This new epistemology will resolve the present environmental crisis. Environmental education, using an action research approach, is presented as a transformation agent to enable epistemological change. Environmental education should act as a pivot in the transformation to better education rather than a band-aid trying to solve environmental problems.
{"title":"Towards better education: Environmental education's pivotal role in the transformation of education","authors":"Prem Naidoo, J. Kruger, D. Brookes","doi":"10.4314/SAJEE.V11I0.137514","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4314/SAJEE.V11I0.137514","url":null,"abstract":"Environmental education as an agent for environmental problem solving has not produced the anticipated results. It is suggested that this is due to the implementation of environmental education in our present education system which espouses a reductionist and mechanistic epistemology. This epistemology is the underlying cause of environmental problems. What is needed, is a new non-exploitative epistemology; one on which better education is based. This new epistemology will resolve the present environmental crisis. Environmental education, using an action research approach, is presented as a transformation agent to enable epistemological change. Environmental education should act as a pivot in the transformation to better education rather than a band-aid trying to solve environmental problems.","PeriodicalId":272843,"journal":{"name":"The Southern African Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"62 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1990-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125444412","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1986-12-01DOI: 10.4314/SAJEE.V2I0.137243
Archibald P. Sia, H. Hungerford, A. N. Tomera
The purpose of this research was to detennine the relative contribution of eight viriables in predicting responsible environmental behaviour. Scores on the Behaviour Inventory of Environmental Action served as the criterion variable. Multilinear regression analyses were used to determine the performance of each predictor variable and to ascertain the most parsimonious set of variables that predicts environmental behaviour. The following conclusions were drawn: (1) All variables, except belief in/ attitude toward technology, were significant individual predictors of environmental behaviour, (2) Stepwise regression showed that the best predictors for all respondents were skill in using environmental action strategies, level of environmental sensitivity and perceived knowledge of environmental action strategies. Profiles of high and low environmentally active groups are described. Results imply that the three major behaviour predictors (perceived skill and knowledge of environmental action strategies and level of environmental sensitivity) need to be addressed in curriculum development and instructional practice.
{"title":"A study of predictors of environmental behaviour using U.S. samples","authors":"Archibald P. Sia, H. Hungerford, A. N. Tomera","doi":"10.4314/SAJEE.V2I0.137243","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4314/SAJEE.V2I0.137243","url":null,"abstract":"The purpose of this research was to detennine the relative contribution of eight viriables in predicting responsible environmental behaviour. Scores on the Behaviour Inventory of Environmental Action served as the criterion variable. Multilinear regression analyses were used to determine the performance of each predictor variable and to ascertain the most parsimonious set of variables that predicts environmental behaviour. The following conclusions were drawn: (1) All variables, except belief in/ attitude toward technology, were significant individual predictors of environmental behaviour, (2) Stepwise regression showed that the best predictors for all respondents were skill in using environmental action strategies, level of environmental sensitivity and perceived knowledge of environmental action strategies. Profiles of high and low environmentally active groups are described. Results imply that the three major behaviour predictors (perceived skill and knowledge of environmental action strategies and level of environmental sensitivity) need to be addressed in curriculum development and instructional practice.","PeriodicalId":272843,"journal":{"name":"The Southern African Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"32 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1986-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129058636","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1900-01-01DOI: 10.4314/SAJEE.V34I0.172215
R. O’Donoghue
This study is developed as a think piece which deliberates the problem of transformative human agency in a curriculum setting. Using a critical realism perspective and schematic tools it examines the deliberative framing of an Amanzi for Food teaching garden as an education process for mediating the learning of rainwater harvesting. Working with Bhaskar’s Transformational Model of Social Activity and using expansions of his ‘four-planar social being’ schema and its resolution in his ‘social cube’ model, the study contemplates the framing for a curriculum for the mediation of co-engaged social learning in the contexts of practical work in an agricultural college curriculum setting. In this way the research process is developed as an under-labouring review of the emerging curriculum in search of theory to inform pedagogy for mediating situated processes of transformative social learning.
{"title":"Think Piece on Amanzi for Food: Working with Critical Realism to Inform a Situated Learning Framework for Climate Change Education","authors":"R. O’Donoghue","doi":"10.4314/SAJEE.V34I0.172215","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4314/SAJEE.V34I0.172215","url":null,"abstract":"This study is developed as a think piece which deliberates the problem of transformative human agency in a curriculum setting. Using a critical realism perspective and schematic tools it examines the deliberative framing of an Amanzi for Food teaching garden as an education process for mediating the learning of rainwater harvesting. Working with Bhaskar’s Transformational Model of Social Activity and using expansions of his ‘four-planar social being’ schema and its resolution in his ‘social cube’ model, the study contemplates the framing for a curriculum for the mediation of co-engaged social learning in the contexts of practical work in an agricultural college curriculum setting. In this way the research process is developed as an under-labouring review of the emerging curriculum in search of theory to inform pedagogy for mediating situated processes of transformative social learning.","PeriodicalId":272843,"journal":{"name":"The Southern African Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"20 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"116662564","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1900-01-01DOI: 10.4314/SAJEE.V19I0.137337
A. Gough
I have been arguing for recognition of the absence and need for inclusion of women's perspectives in environmental education research and pedagogy for some time (see, for example, Greenan Gough 1993, Gough 1987b, 1999). In this paper I explore the related issue of the potential of adopting feminist research methods and methodologies in environmental education research. This exploration includes a discussion of the importance of developing a feminist perspective, the characteristics of feminist educational research, and a review of feminist research in environmental education. The paper concludes with a discussion of feminist poststructuralist research as a powerful and promising approach for future research in environmental education.
{"title":"The power and promise of feminist research in environmental education","authors":"A. Gough","doi":"10.4314/SAJEE.V19I0.137337","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4314/SAJEE.V19I0.137337","url":null,"abstract":"I have been arguing for recognition of the absence and need for inclusion of women's perspectives in environmental education research and pedagogy for some time (see, for example, Greenan Gough 1993, Gough 1987b, 1999). In this paper I explore the related issue of the potential of adopting feminist research methods and methodologies in environmental education research. This exploration includes a discussion of the importance of developing a feminist perspective, the characteristics of feminist educational research, and a review of feminist research in environmental education. The paper concludes with a discussion of feminist poststructuralist research as a powerful and promising approach for future research in environmental education.","PeriodicalId":272843,"journal":{"name":"The Southern African Journal of Environmental Education","volume":" 22","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"120830946","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1900-01-01DOI: 10.4314/SAJEE.V34I0.172217
Sofiya Henrietta Angelina Olsen
By drawing on a 12-week anthropological fieldwork study, I explore how education for sustainable development is perceived and practised in the Danish folk high school course Green Guerrilla. Through the emic approach of sustainability Bildung I argue that the Green Guerrilla course constitutes a radical political imaginary; a space where the students learn to train their sociological imagination and reflect upon themselves and their own culture and society from an outside perspective in order to imagine how it can be structured differently. I argue that during a five-day study trip to a Swedish forest, the students learn to be in and actively engage with nature through the senses, and experience how they are inextricably connected with their environment. They learn that creating a sustainable world means ‘dealing with your own shit’, in more ways than one. Through this sustainability Bildung the students learn that it is up to them to ‘find their own forest’ – that is, to figure out how they can create the lives that they want to live in the future.
{"title":"Think Piece on Green Guerrilla: Creating Sustainable Development through Sustainability Bildung","authors":"Sofiya Henrietta Angelina Olsen","doi":"10.4314/SAJEE.V34I0.172217","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4314/SAJEE.V34I0.172217","url":null,"abstract":"By drawing on a 12-week anthropological fieldwork study, I explore how education for sustainable development is perceived and practised in the Danish folk high school course Green Guerrilla. Through the emic approach of sustainability Bildung I argue that the Green Guerrilla course constitutes a radical political imaginary; a space where the students learn to train their sociological imagination and reflect upon themselves and their own culture and society from an outside perspective in order to imagine how it can be structured differently. I argue that during a five-day study trip to a Swedish forest, the students learn to be in and actively engage with nature through the senses, and experience how they are inextricably connected with their environment. They learn that creating a sustainable world means ‘dealing with your own shit’, in more ways than one. Through this sustainability Bildung the students learn that it is up to them to ‘find their own forest’ – that is, to figure out how they can create the lives that they want to live in the future.","PeriodicalId":272843,"journal":{"name":"The Southern African Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"120 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121364495","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1900-01-01DOI: 10.4314/SAJEE.V32I1.152741
T. Pesanayi, Farasten Mashozhera, L. Khitsane
Teaching youths about the subject of water for agriculture is vital in southern Africa where climate adaptation is imperative. Fresh water is a critical natural resource experiencing dangerous scarcity globally, with climate change and variability being key drivers. Agriculture consumes most of the allocated water in most of the southern African countries, so this sector needs particular water harvesting and conservation education. The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) reported that 93% of cultivated land in southern Africa was rain-fed at the beginning of the 21st century. Drought hinders effective agricultural practices in poor-rainfall areas and is a common feature in most southern African countries. Increasingly frequent drought events affect Lesotho, South Africa and Zimbabwe chronically due to climate variability and change. These three countries have school curricula that carry agricultural and sustainability learning to varying extents. Agriculture is taught as a science subject, and tends to be inclined towards normative technicist approaches at the expense of traditional and innovative sustainability practices. This omission in curriculum development and teaching may miss the opportunity to learn from lessons offered by these traditional and innovative systems that have demonstrated resilience to climate variability and change. This paper explores the opportunities and enablers of sustainability learning and relevance in the primary school agriculture curricula of these three countries. The paper argues for inclusion of sustainable agricultural water learning as an act of educational quality and relevance that reflects 21st century socio-ecological, agro-climate and socioeconomic challenges in southern Africa. Key words: primary school, water for agriculture, rainwater harvesting and conservation, learning.
{"title":"Teaching and Learning of ‘Water for Agriculture’ in Primary Schools in Lesotho, South Africa and Zimbabwe","authors":"T. Pesanayi, Farasten Mashozhera, L. Khitsane","doi":"10.4314/SAJEE.V32I1.152741","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4314/SAJEE.V32I1.152741","url":null,"abstract":"Teaching youths about the subject of water for agriculture is vital in southern Africa where climate adaptation is imperative. Fresh water is a critical natural resource experiencing dangerous scarcity globally, with climate change and variability being key drivers. Agriculture consumes most of the allocated water in most of the southern African countries, so this sector needs particular water harvesting and conservation education. The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) reported that 93% of cultivated land in southern Africa was rain-fed at the beginning of the 21st century. Drought hinders effective agricultural practices in poor-rainfall areas and is a common feature in most southern African countries. Increasingly frequent drought events affect Lesotho, South Africa and Zimbabwe chronically due to climate variability and change. These three countries have school curricula that carry agricultural and sustainability learning to varying extents. Agriculture is taught as a science subject, and tends to be inclined towards normative technicist approaches at the expense of traditional and innovative sustainability practices. This omission in curriculum development and teaching may miss the opportunity to learn from lessons offered by these traditional and innovative systems that have demonstrated resilience to climate variability and change. This paper explores the opportunities and enablers of sustainability learning and relevance in the primary school agriculture curricula of these three countries. The paper argues for inclusion of sustainable agricultural water learning as an act of educational quality and relevance that reflects 21st century socio-ecological, agro-climate and socioeconomic challenges in southern Africa. Key words: primary school, water for agriculture, rainwater harvesting and conservation, learning.","PeriodicalId":272843,"journal":{"name":"The Southern African Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"35 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125797729","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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