The Ministry of Eco Education – A partnership of teachers, supported by the Green Britain Foundation, has been formed to create ‘the education we need now’. Working with teachers and children, the group has co-created a curriculum which places sustainability at the heart of education. The curriculum brings together the best resources already out there, into one cohesive and holistic curriculum, weaving together materials through broad enquiry questions. You can read the scoping report here and/or contact Paul Turner at: ministryofEcoEducation@gmail.com
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BERA Policy Brief – Following their first set of workshops with over 100 teachers, teacher educators and young people, the team behind BERA’s latest research commission are sharing a summary of findings in a policy brief. In this, policy-makers are called on to: [1] Initiate a review of the secondary curriculum with teacher and student involvement. [2] Hold schools to account for sustainability through existing frameworks and standards. [3] Create an external accredited award scheme to value individual and collective efforts and environmental leadership. [4] Enlist the endorsement of respected public figures to promote education for environmental sustainability. The full illustrated manifesto will be launched on Monday 1st November at 1700 – details and registration will open soon.
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26,000 Climate Conversations – Students and recent graduates from the Oxford University School of Geography and the Environment have launched a campaign – 26,000 Climate Conversations – whose goal is to inspire and track conversations about climate change worldwide by 1 November 2021, the first day of COP26. NAEE would like to encourage you to get involved and hold climate conversations in your classrooms or with friends, families, and communities. The website contains a section of conversation advice from climate leaders containing short inspirational statements on the importance of climate conversations and guidance on how to have a successful conversation. Some suggested conversation starters are here, and you can sign up and get started here.
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Making an Environmental Difference – An article in The Converation explores why some young people want an alternative to protests as a means of making an environmental difference. Researchers conducted a qualitative study with 121 young people in England and Northern Ireland where fracking had either been a lived reality or a possibility. They explored how the youngsters felt about both the environmental issues local communities were worried about, and the political processes in place to deal with them.
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A Greener Curriculum – The FED will be focusing on sustainability and education in future discussions, addressing questions around a greener curriculum, a sustainable infrastructure for school buildings, and the future impact of climate change and ambitions for net carbon provision across education. It notes that a recent analysis by Global Action Plan which was released on Clean Air Day found that at least 25% of UK pupils attend schools where air pollution is over the World Health Organisation limit, and that an Estimated 3.4m children currently learn in unhealthy environments.
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Teach for the Planet – EARTHDAY’s climate literacy campaign is now supported by over 550 organisations and Education International’s Teach for the Planet is calling for quality climate education for all.
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Supporting Curriculum Reform – UNESCO has set a new target to make environmental education a core curriculum component in all countries by 2025. It did this in the build-up to its recent Berlin Conference. The Organization says it is working with its 193 Member States to “support curriculum reform and track progress to ensure everyone acquires the knowledge, skills, values and attitudes to introduce positive change and protect our planet’s future.” Director General, Audrey Azoulay, said: “Education must prepare learners to understand the current crisis and shape the future. To save our planet, we must transform the way we live, produce, consume and interact with nature. Integrating education for sustainable development into all learning programmes must become fundamental, everywhere.”
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The Other Environmental Emergency – Sometimes it seems that climate change gets all the publicity, but the loss of biodiversity poses just as much of a threat to humanity as the climate. The latest Technology Quarterly in The Economist has a focus on biodiversity and argues that technology has a growing role to play in monitoring, modelling and protecting ecosystems. One part of the briefing deals with modelling ecosystems. There is much in all this of use to students interested in ecology and biodiversity.
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Climate Grief, Science and Action – Students at Manchester University have written a Handbook for Climate Grief, Science and Action. Although designed for HE/FE readers, there is much in here of relevance to students in schools.
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6 Principles of Outdoor Learning – Learning through Landscapes has developed an online training platform, with the aim of making high-quality outdoor learning accessible to as many teachers and educators as possible. For now, the platform features courses on taking literacy and numeracy outdoors and a free course about LtL’s newly formed 6 Principles of Outdoor Learning, but it will expand. The 6 Principles were formed from conversations about the core of what LtL believes outdoor learning can and should be, and they will be the foundation for the support offered to teachers and educators from now on. You can read more about LtL developments in a recent blog from CEO Carley Sefton.
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Rural Studies – Gardeners’ World presenter Carol Klein has endorsed the Young London SOS campaign and made a plea to put gardening on the school curriculum citing multiple benefits including to mental and physical health. 60 years ago, this would have been part of rural studies and was an established part of the life of many secondary modern schools. So much so that in 1960 local and regional teacher groups came together to promote rural studies and natural history teaching in schools through the National Rural Studies Association [NRSA]. It was this group that evolved into NAEE because of the growth of “the environment” as a social concern. But as the many schools that now include gardening know, it’s good for everyone, and not just the few.
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Gardening and Handwork in Schools – Educational School Gardening and Handwork was written in 1913 by GWS Brewer who was the Inspector of Educational School Gardening in Somerset. Rather amazingly, it is still available. The publishers say that it “provides a practical guide to the development of school gardens and the value of gardens for the broader educational process. Illustrative figures are incorporated throughout and exercises are included at the end of the text. This book will be of value to anyone with an interest in horticulture and the history of education.” It’s a book that is both of its time – with its views on what education is for – and the conveyer of practical advice which has stood the test of time.
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The Lynx – Inkcap has a feature on plans to rewild the Somerleyton Estate in East Anglia – including the return of the lynx. You can read about it here. For students studying such plans, a letter from an ethicist and an agrologist in a 2020 edition of the Economist adds a particular perspective to the argument. This includes the following: “… your analysis of the rewilding of Scotland missed a deep irony in the effort to create a landscape purified of human influence. This concept of natural excludes humans, but at the same time envisages a highly managed, human-constructed landscape achieved by human processes, undertaken for human goals, and based on the best human guess of what those landscapes used to be like. The reality is that it is impossible to go back. Whatever natural world existed before humans is lost to us for ever. What is created in the project of rewilding is but a simulacrum of the prehuman ideal. In addition, this concept of “natural” morally bypasses issues of justice. This is an exercise of the hyper-wealthy, with a contempt for the lives of people, plants and animals whose home this has been for millennia. It could be described as a project in environmental colonialism, where those enlightened, wealthy few civilise the locals or take their land in order to make the world as it should be.” Discuss …
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The Little Things that Run the World – The organisers of National Insect Week are asking all of us to think about the little things that run the world and do things and add online using the hashtags #EntoAtHome #NIW2020. Ideas for activities include take a photograph and enter the NIW competition, download the garden entomology booklet or check out the many activities suggestions for primary, secondary, adults, everyone including poetry and build your own dung beetle.