International Council of Associations for Science Education

Sustainability / Environmental Education

Sustainability in the Science Curriculum
 

The major issue currently facing the Earth (and humans) is the lack of recognition of the interconnection between humans and the biosphere, the atmosphere and other systems of the planet and the inappropriate technologies currently in use. Humans have overused and polluted the biotic and abiotic resources of the Earth.

In terms of building environmental literacy and responding to the major issues facing humans, it would be wise to develop a progression in underpinning ideas, skills and values in:

• Living things / Biology - global threats to biodiversity and consequent actions to be taken, ecosystem services and disturbance to these, interconnection of all life on earth and their connections with the abiotic environment, exponential human population growth and accelerating use of resources, building skills and experiences in the natural environment, making environmentally responsible choices.

• Energy / Physics - environmentally appropriate technology choices especially in energy production, efficiency and use, choosing low energy options, replacement of carbon-based with renewable, non-nuclear energy sources.

• Chemistry / matter – environmentally appropriate cradle to grave processing, use and disposal and selection of materials (green chemistry), minimising waste / pollution.

• Earth – sustainability and ecological footprint in resource planning, development and use, protection of assets – water, topsoil, air, bio and habitat diversity, the connectivity between the biosphere and the other earth systems, recognition of important reserves eg of water, biodiversity, climate change.

Example: Living things with Living things / Biology – detail of concepts for curricula inclusion

The following interconnected ideas or concepts (not in any order) contribute to an understanding in Living things / biology:
 - Biological systems
 - Biodiversity
 - Evolution – variation, isolation, selection, adaptation and as a central idea for biodiversity
 - The impacts of humans and the related ideas of sustainability.
 - Plants as the basis of food
 - Hands-on exploration and investigations of the natural environment
 - Anthropocene period
 - Ecosystem services
 - Biodiversity at the genetic, organism and ecosystem levels and the idea of hotspots
 - Uniqueness, geographic distribution and endemism of particular ecosystems
 - Threatened species, communities and threatening processes
 - Ecosystem persistence / resilience / succession / tipping points
 - Survival of organisms and ecosystems
 - Plants as the basis of food and oxygen production and the sun as the energy source.
 - Human overuse of the environment, pollution and rapid change, conservation,
 - Human plunder or destruction of habitat of migrating species have consequences for those species and all ecosystems visited by those species.
 - Consequences of accelerating human population growth (exponential) and consumption of resources
Indigenous perspectives on management of environments.

How to start using these curriculum ideas in the classroom:

Choose a starting focus for your country, an appropriate student age group and an educational strategy.

For example:
- Threats to Wildlife. Place – Australia.
- Threatening processes. Important concepts that exemplify issues that affect Australians and affect the integrity of Australia’s unique, endemic wildlife are threatening processes.
- Student group 9-12 year olds.
- Educational strategy – cause and effect, interactions, systems; using field studies, hands-on activities, simulation, research, mapping/graphing, classification keys, simple food chain activities.
- Cause and effect relationships and interactions understanding can be through concepts involving threatened species and threatening processes. In 9-12 year olds, that could be represented by the effect on individuals, species and ecosystems of introducing feral organisms (eg cane toads, cats, rabbits and foxes) and also the effect of wildfire as a threat to organisms and ecosystems. These cover biotic and abiotic threats. Threatened Australian iconic species could be studied and what causes them to be under threat.
- Each country would have set of threats that are critical to the survival of their biodiversity or ecosystem services. A science curriculum could start with a focus on these.
A Glossary of Terms that may be useful in teacher understanding of the current environment is attached in Appendix A.

Pedagogy
Pedagogical approaches should attempt to build connections between the child and the environment. Activities in the natural environment (with care for the environment as a strong message) is an essential pedagogy for this area, with hands-on approaches that optimise engagement, ownership, inquiry and emotional attachment by the children to the environment.
 

APPENDIX A

Glossary of important terms and ideas for a Sustainability in Science Curriculum

Anthropocene:

The most recent period of Earth’s history, generally referring to the past two centuries, characterized by human activities having a substantial impact on global ecosystems and climate.

Anthroposhere:

A division of the Earth referring to that part of the environment made by or strongly shaped by human activities.

Complex System:

A set of multiple, diverse, and interacting components whose overall (system level) behavior is not predictable from measurement of the components alone. Complexity arises due to nonlinear responses and feedbacks among the system components. Complex systems are typically also complicated systems in that a large number of different components may be involved and operate over a range of different spatial, temporal, and organizational scales.

Complex Adaptive Systems:

Complex systems that include components having the capability to learn from experience, e.g., living organisms or human systems, and change in response to overall system level behavior.

Ecosystem Services:

The resources and services provided to humans from natural ecosystems; these can be subdivided into provisioning (e.g., oxygen, absorption of carbon dioxide, water, food), regulating (e.g., flood control), supporting (e.g. pollination), cultural (e.g., recreation), and preserving (e.g., resiliency to disruption) services.

Interdisciplinary Research:

The integration of approaches, concepts, and data from multiple science and engineering disciplines to advance understanding and address problems in a fashion that is more comprehensive and synthetic than is possible using only the perspective of a single discipline.

Resiliency:

The ability to recover from disruption, or the rate of its return, to some prior state following a perturbation.

Sustainability:

The ability to continue or persist into the long-term while maintaining a particular set of characteristics or functionalities. Sustainability may involve components or mechanisms that promote resiliency but is a broader concept than just recovery from perturbation.

Tipping Point:

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