David Whitley argues that environmental education needs imaginative literature. Ecoliteracy was a term that gained currency in environmental education from the late 1990s. During the period leading up to this, the concept of ‘literacy’ had been extended to encompass a whole range of new areas – even including ‘emotional literacy’ – where existing cultural norms seemed inadequate.…
Mervat Batarseh Head of Environmental Education Section at Jordan’s Royal Society for the Conservation of Nature writes about their interactive community and school-based programme on the locally threatened Dead Sea Sparrow. Talking about birds is always an interesting issue for both students and elders. As a professional in the field of environmental education. I have been monitoring…
Mary Sellers FarmBuddies writes about improving the wellbeing of young people and adults. Social Farming, also known as Care Farming, is the practice of offering Family Farms and other similar farming holdings as a form of social service. Some farms can be a specialized treatment farm but more often they remain a typical working farm where…
Rebecca Kitchen Secondary Curriculum Leader, Geographical Association, writes about the Geography Quality Mark: making an impact on teaching and learning. As Head of Geography at Aylesbury High School, I found this incredibly powerful: my geography department improvement plan was informed by the Quality Mark, and vice versa. It also enabled the whole department to be involved…
Kashmir Flint, Environmental Education Officer at the Monkton Nature Reserve (and until recently, NAEE’s Facebook editor), writes about the reserve and about her work there. Monkton Nature Reserve is a 16-acre former chalk quarry based in Thanet, Kent, run by a small independent charity. Thanet is one of the most deprived areas in Kent with tree coverage…
Tim Baker Headteacher, Charlton Manor School, Greenwich, and an NAEE Fellow, writes about a recent school trip to Cornwall. On the farm Recently I organised a trip for 6 pupils to stay on a farm in Cornwall for 4 days. During this time, they practised and learned skills such as fire lighting, shelter building and raft…
Findlay Wilde says that there are two very simple facts to keep in mind throughout this article: The human race cannot survive without the natural world. The human race is responsible for devastating the environment/natural world. It seems like madness when you see it written down like that, doesn’t it? Why would anyone destroy…
Clare Whitelegg is RSPB Schools Outreach Officer in Eastern England. Here she writes about birds as a source of inspiration. The breeze in your hair, golden leaves on an autumnal oak and the gentle ‘tsetse’ calls of long tailed tits high up in the branches: a moment of ‘connection to nature’ on one of the RSPB’s Schools Outreach…
Michael Holland, Head of Education at London’s Chelsea Physic Garden writes about his work with schools and young people. When working with visiting school groups, one of the first questions I ask of them is “Did anyone eat any plants for breakfast?” Often, the response is laughter and disbelief that a grown man would ask such…
Rosalinda Hernandez, Francisco Santiago and Laura Santiago are teachers at Ixtlan de Juarez primary school in Mexico, and Barbara Bodenhorn is an academic researcher at the University of Cambridge. Together, they describe their work in the AHRC Pathways project. The Sierra Norte is one of the areas of greatest biodiversity in the State of Oaxaca as…
Rachel Wooller is a Cambridge-based studio artist who works with recycled wood and metal as well as concrete, acrylic and wire. She is currently working on a series of floor based pieces that explore the power relation between materials. As part of the Pathways Project, Rachel was asked to facilitate a den making project with…
Exploring the environmental aspects of locality as a response to curriculum change in Mongolia In the academic year 2014 and 2015, a major modification of the core curriculum of primary education has been introduced in every school in Mongolia. It has strong emphasis on encouraging different learning approaches, opposing traditional classroom teaching where didactic teacher…