Abstract Early childhood is an important time for building children’s affinity with nature and the environment. Early childhood professionals play a crucial role in developing young children’s understanding of the natural world. Over the past 50 years, there has been a movement in early childhood education and care contexts to provide young children with the opportunity to learn in natural surroundings such as forest schools and nature kindergartens. This research, occurred in four bush kinders, an Australian example of nature-based, early years education influenced by the forest school approach to education. In this paper we interrogate key ideas concerning environmental education, drawing on seminal empirical research, guiding curriculum documents such as Australia’s Early Years Learning Framework and government policy documents to build understandings of how children’s play can be observed by educators who can then support the children to develop their understandings of the natural world around them. Through ethnography, a methodology that uses both participation and observation of research participants, it became apparent that young children’s play-based learning offers opportunities for development of understandings of the environment. Applying a recent definition of environmental education from the US Environmental Protection Authority (2022), we analysed four vignettes which provide examples of educators and children’s interactions supporting children to build an affinity with nature observed during the research. This research’s implications are novel when considering the relatively new bush kinder approach to early childhood education as the findings remind us of the benefits of bush kinders in generating opportunities for young children’s environmental education.
{"title":"Bush Kinders: Building Young Children’s Relationships with the Environment","authors":"Chris Speldewinde, Coral Campbell","doi":"10.1017/aee.2023.36","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/aee.2023.36","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Early childhood is an important time for building children’s affinity with nature and the environment. Early childhood professionals play a crucial role in developing young children’s understanding of the natural world. Over the past 50 years, there has been a movement in early childhood education and care contexts to provide young children with the opportunity to learn in natural surroundings such as forest schools and nature kindergartens. This research, occurred in four bush kinders, an Australian example of nature-based, early years education influenced by the forest school approach to education. In this paper we interrogate key ideas concerning environmental education, drawing on seminal empirical research, guiding curriculum documents such as Australia’s Early Years Learning Framework and government policy documents to build understandings of how children’s play can be observed by educators who can then support the children to develop their understandings of the natural world around them. Through ethnography, a methodology that uses both participation and observation of research participants, it became apparent that young children’s play-based learning offers opportunities for development of understandings of the environment. Applying a recent definition of environmental education from the US Environmental Protection Authority (2022), we analysed four vignettes which provide examples of educators and children’s interactions supporting children to build an affinity with nature observed during the research. This research’s implications are novel when considering the relatively new bush kinder approach to early childhood education as the findings remind us of the benefits of bush kinders in generating opportunities for young children’s environmental education.","PeriodicalId":44842,"journal":{"name":"Australian Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"56 2","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135863977","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}
Zoe Mintoff, Peter Andersen, Jane Warren, Sue Elliott, Carolan Nicholson, Helen Byfield-Fleming, Fiona Barber
Abstract The ideal period for implementing environmental education or education for sustainability is during the early childhood years. The educational context of playgroups can be a platform for both children and their parents to learn together and together engage in early childhood education for sustainability (ECEfS), however there is a paucity of literature examining ECEfS within Australian playgroup contexts. The Little Explorers Playgroup (LEP) is a facilitated playgroup located in a sustainable living centre in Sydney, Australia, and provides opportunities for children and their parents to engage in ECEfS. The study purpose was to evaluate the effect of the LEP on the participating children and parents’ environmental attitudes and behaviours. This qualitative study was designed as a single critical case study employing semi-structured telephone interviews conducted with twenty-three participants, including three LEP playgroup facilitators and 20 parents. The data generated by the interviews was analysed thematically and the findings indicated that the LEP empowered and positively transformed both the children and parents’ environmental attitudes and behaviours. This was evident through the children and parents’ adoption of more environmentally responsible attitudes and behaviours. The findings demonstrate that playgroups may be an untapped opportunity for facilitating community change towards sustainable living.
{"title":"The Effectiveness of a Community-Based Playgroup in Inspiring Positive Changes in the Environmental Attitudes and Behaviours of Children and their Parents: A Qualitative Case Study","authors":"Zoe Mintoff, Peter Andersen, Jane Warren, Sue Elliott, Carolan Nicholson, Helen Byfield-Fleming, Fiona Barber","doi":"10.1017/aee.2023.32","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/aee.2023.32","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract The ideal period for implementing environmental education or education for sustainability is during the early childhood years. The educational context of playgroups can be a platform for both children and their parents to learn together and together engage in early childhood education for sustainability (ECEfS), however there is a paucity of literature examining ECEfS within Australian playgroup contexts. The Little Explorers Playgroup (LEP) is a facilitated playgroup located in a sustainable living centre in Sydney, Australia, and provides opportunities for children and their parents to engage in ECEfS. The study purpose was to evaluate the effect of the LEP on the participating children and parents’ environmental attitudes and behaviours. This qualitative study was designed as a single critical case study employing semi-structured telephone interviews conducted with twenty-three participants, including three LEP playgroup facilitators and 20 parents. The data generated by the interviews was analysed thematically and the findings indicated that the LEP empowered and positively transformed both the children and parents’ environmental attitudes and behaviours. This was evident through the children and parents’ adoption of more environmentally responsible attitudes and behaviours. The findings demonstrate that playgroups may be an untapped opportunity for facilitating community change towards sustainable living.","PeriodicalId":44842,"journal":{"name":"Australian Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"23 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136382247","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}
Abstract This paper explores the question of what matters and what is made to matter — the ethics of encounters in the intimate entwining of ontology and epistemology. Within an ethics based on matter and mattering, it explores the evolving symbiotic entanglement of humans with each other and with non-human beings, who, with us, make up the world. Our complex symbiotic relationality is discussed in relation to the limiting force of neoliberalism, where all that matters is economic growth and productivity. It asks what hope there is for the survival of the planet, when so many humans, including politicians of almost every stripe, have lost the capacity to think outside the neoliberal box. As things stand, as one scientist observed, it is as if we have a medical, terminal diagnosis, and, although there is a cure, we choose to ignore it. It asks what are those cures and explores the possibility that we humans might learn to respond — to be response-able to our planet, in its state of terminal distress.
{"title":"New principles to live by: and a change of skin","authors":"Bronwyn Davies","doi":"10.1017/aee.2023.34","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/aee.2023.34","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This paper explores the question of what matters and what is made to matter — the ethics of encounters in the intimate entwining of ontology and epistemology. Within an ethics based on matter and mattering, it explores the evolving symbiotic entanglement of humans with each other and with non-human beings, who, with us, make up the world. Our complex symbiotic relationality is discussed in relation to the limiting force of neoliberalism, where all that matters is economic growth and productivity. It asks what hope there is for the survival of the planet, when so many humans, including politicians of almost every stripe, have lost the capacity to think outside the neoliberal box. As things stand, as one scientist observed, it is as if we have a medical, terminal diagnosis, and, although there is a cure, we choose to ignore it. It asks what are those cures and explores the possibility that we humans might learn to respond — to be response-able to our planet, in its state of terminal distress.","PeriodicalId":44842,"journal":{"name":"Australian Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"46 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135885016","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}
Abstract The Kigali Amendment introduced a new family of chemical compounds, which do not contribute to stratospheric ozone depletion but present a high global warming potential, under the watch of the Montreal Protocol in 2016. Earlier this year, a press note from the World Meteorological Organization entitled “Ozone layer recovery is on track, helping avoid global warming by 0.5°C” caught our attention because of the wrong conclusions that can be potentially drawn by laypersons due to an apparent linkage of ozone depletion and global warming problems. Public communication of the Montreal Protocol since the Kigali Amendment should be more careful than ever to avoid lessening the social perception of the threat of climate change, particularly considering that society already has a distorted representation of these problems, assuming causal relations between ozone depletion and climate change, that could lead to unfounded optimism towards the climate crisis.
{"title":"Regarding the Montreal Protocol communication after the Kigali Amendment","authors":"Júlio J. Conde, Pablo Á. Meira-Cartea","doi":"10.1017/aee.2023.35","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/aee.2023.35","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract The Kigali Amendment introduced a new family of chemical compounds, which do not contribute to stratospheric ozone depletion but present a high global warming potential, under the watch of the Montreal Protocol in 2016. Earlier this year, a press note from the World Meteorological Organization entitled “Ozone layer recovery is on track, helping avoid global warming by 0.5°C” caught our attention because of the wrong conclusions that can be potentially drawn by laypersons due to an apparent linkage of ozone depletion and global warming problems. Public communication of the Montreal Protocol since the Kigali Amendment should be more careful than ever to avoid lessening the social perception of the threat of climate change, particularly considering that society already has a distorted representation of these problems, assuming causal relations between ozone depletion and climate change, that could lead to unfounded optimism towards the climate crisis.","PeriodicalId":44842,"journal":{"name":"Australian Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"74 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136356422","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}
A review of ‘Ending Plastic Waste – Community Actions Around the World’ - B.D. Hardesty, K. Willis, J. Barrett, & C. Wilcox (2023). Ending plastic waste – Community actions around the world. Victoria, Australia: CSIRO Publishing
《终结塑料垃圾——全球社区行动》综述——B.D. Hardesty, K. Willis, J. Barrett， &C. Wilcox(2023)。终结塑料垃圾——世界各地的社区行动。维多利亚，澳大利亚:CSIRO出版
{"title":"A review of ‘<i>Ending Plastic Waste – Community Actions Around the World</i>’ - B.D. Hardesty, K. Willis, J. Barrett, & C. Wilcox (2023). Ending plastic waste – Community actions around the world. Victoria, Australia: CSIRO Publishing","authors":"Bruna Iotti Amaral","doi":"10.1017/aee.2023.31","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/aee.2023.31","url":null,"abstract":"A review of ‘Ending Plastic Waste – Community Actions Around the World’ - B.D. Hardesty, K. Willis, J. Barrett, & C. Wilcox (2023). Ending plastic waste – Community actions around the world. Victoria, Australia: CSIRO Publishing","PeriodicalId":44842,"journal":{"name":"Australian Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"2 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135817445","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}
Abstract This study examines the perceptions and attitudes of 234 Greek secondary school students regarding ecological issues arising from human intervention in food webs. The results of this study indicate that the following factors are crucial for students’ attitudes toward environmental protection: scientific knowledge, perceptions of the relationship between humans and nature and personal motivations. It was found that those students who understand the interconnectedness of populations in food webs are able to evaluate arguments on an ecological issue and have positive attitudes toward environmental protection. However, students who have limited knowledge in evaluating arguments make decisions to solve environmental problems based on their perception of human-nature relationships. Thus, it has been shown that students who adopt an ecocentric or biocentric view sometimes adopt a negative or neutral attitude toward environmental protection because their incomplete knowledge leads them to misjudge the ecological impact of the proposed solutions. This study confirms that the development of values is best accompanied by the development of basic ecological knowledge. It also recognizes the usefulness of food webs as a means of revealing students’ worldviews. Finally, the food web proves to be a specific indicator of the attitudes studied.
{"title":"Students’ perceptions of the natural world and their attitudes toward ecological issues: What is the relationship between them?","authors":"Irene Bayati","doi":"10.1017/aee.2023.29","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/aee.2023.29","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This study examines the perceptions and attitudes of 234 Greek secondary school students regarding ecological issues arising from human intervention in food webs. The results of this study indicate that the following factors are crucial for students’ attitudes toward environmental protection: scientific knowledge, perceptions of the relationship between humans and nature and personal motivations. It was found that those students who understand the interconnectedness of populations in food webs are able to evaluate arguments on an ecological issue and have positive attitudes toward environmental protection. However, students who have limited knowledge in evaluating arguments make decisions to solve environmental problems based on their perception of human-nature relationships. Thus, it has been shown that students who adopt an ecocentric or biocentric view sometimes adopt a negative or neutral attitude toward environmental protection because their incomplete knowledge leads them to misjudge the ecological impact of the proposed solutions. This study confirms that the development of values is best accompanied by the development of basic ecological knowledge. It also recognizes the usefulness of food webs as a means of revealing students’ worldviews. Finally, the food web proves to be a specific indicator of the attitudes studied.","PeriodicalId":44842,"journal":{"name":"Australian Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"19 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135016092","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}
Abstract The past two decades have seen a proliferation of Indigenous philosophy in environmental education. Much of this anti and decolonial work has made significant advances in deconstructing western modernist subjectivities; re-embedding and re-situating Indigenous and western relational epistemologies into human-earth relationality, including critical inquiry into questions of positionality, power-knowledge and human and more-than-human agency. Less articulated, however is the potential of these practices to address large scale and interrelated global challenges associated with climate and cultural-ecological crisis which coincide with the intensification of late capitalism, colonialism, and white supremacism. Relatedly, at global levels human rights approaches to planetary wellbeing continue to predominate and prominent international agreements such as UNDRIP, SDG, IPCCC and the Global Compact for Migration remain siloed from one another. Providing a broad sketch of these themes I then propose a whakapapa or kinship-based approach to life as laying the conceptual foundation for three regenerative place-based strategies which I subsequently introduce. Each strategy treats contemporary global challenges as interconnected and positions Indigenous knowledges and lifeways as playing a crucial role in addressing these. Moving from Indigenous philosophy in environmental education to broad intersectoral action, these strategies also make the interconnections between individual, collectivist, and structural approaches to Indigenous-led intergenerational resilience as one means to support our collective action toward healing human-environmental relations.
{"title":"From Indigenous philosophy in environmental education to Indigenous planetary futures: what would it take?","authors":"Lewis Williams","doi":"10.1017/aee.2023.23","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/aee.2023.23","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract The past two decades have seen a proliferation of Indigenous philosophy in environmental education. Much of this anti and decolonial work has made significant advances in deconstructing western modernist subjectivities; re-embedding and re-situating Indigenous and western relational epistemologies into human-earth relationality, including critical inquiry into questions of positionality, power-knowledge and human and more-than-human agency. Less articulated, however is the potential of these practices to address large scale and interrelated global challenges associated with climate and cultural-ecological crisis which coincide with the intensification of late capitalism, colonialism, and white supremacism. Relatedly, at global levels human rights approaches to planetary wellbeing continue to predominate and prominent international agreements such as UNDRIP, SDG, IPCCC and the Global Compact for Migration remain siloed from one another. Providing a broad sketch of these themes I then propose a whakapapa or kinship-based approach to life as laying the conceptual foundation for three regenerative place-based strategies which I subsequently introduce. Each strategy treats contemporary global challenges as interconnected and positions Indigenous knowledges and lifeways as playing a crucial role in addressing these. Moving from Indigenous philosophy in environmental education to broad intersectoral action, these strategies also make the interconnections between individual, collectivist, and structural approaches to Indigenous-led intergenerational resilience as one means to support our collective action toward healing human-environmental relations.","PeriodicalId":44842,"journal":{"name":"Australian Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"24 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135878789","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}
A review of “Indigenous Intergenerational Resilience: Confronting Cultural and Ecological Crisis” - L. Williams (2022). Indigenous intergenerational resilience: Confronting cultural and ecological crisis. Taylor and Francis.
“土著代际弹性:面对文化和生态危机”综述- L. Williams(2022)。土著代际弹性:面对文化和生态危机。泰勒和弗朗西斯。
{"title":"A review of “<i>Indigenous Intergenerational Resilience: Confronting Cultural and Ecological Crisis</i>” - L. Williams (2022). Indigenous intergenerational resilience: Confronting cultural and ecological crisis. Taylor and Francis.","authors":"Bronwyn A. Sutton","doi":"10.1017/aee.2023.25","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/aee.2023.25","url":null,"abstract":"A review of “Indigenous Intergenerational Resilience: Confronting Cultural and Ecological Crisis” - L. Williams (2022). Indigenous intergenerational resilience: Confronting cultural and ecological crisis. Taylor and Francis.","PeriodicalId":44842,"journal":{"name":"Australian Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"39 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135981205","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":"A review of “The Symbiotic City” - M. Stuiver (Ed.). (2022). The symbiotic city. Wageningen University Press.","authors":"Marco Amati","doi":"10.1017/aee.2023.18","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/aee.2023.18","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":44842,"journal":{"name":"Australian Journal of Environmental Education","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-09-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43403908","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}
Amsal Alhayat, Risti Dwi Lestari, Maurra Syifah Wijaya
A review of “Science Education and International Cross-cultural Reciprocal Learning Perspective from the Nature Notes Program” - G. Zhou, Y. Li, & J. Luo (Eds.). (2023). Science education and international cross-cultural reciprocal learning perspective from the nature notes program. Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan.
{"title":"A review of “<i>Science Education and International Cross-cultural Reciprocal Learning Perspective from the Nature Notes Program</i>” - G. Zhou, Y. Li, & J. Luo (Eds.). (2023). Science education and international cross-cultural reciprocal learning perspective from the nature notes program. Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan.","authors":"Amsal Alhayat, Risti Dwi Lestari, Maurra Syifah Wijaya","doi":"10.1017/aee.2023.15","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/aee.2023.15","url":null,"abstract":"A review of “Science Education and International Cross-cultural Reciprocal Learning Perspective from the Nature Notes Program” - G. Zhou, Y. Li, & J. Luo (Eds.). (2023). Science education and international cross-cultural reciprocal learning perspective from the nature notes program. Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan.","PeriodicalId":44842,"journal":{"name":"Australian Journal of Environmental Education","volume":"30 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135254271","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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