"Geography--a portrait of current practice" in Scottish secondary schools is one of a developing series of publications by Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Education (HMIE), designed to reflect current good practice in subjects and aspects of Scottish education and identify areas for further improvement. The portrait series is a new…

In this paper we present a field-based practical exercise that allows students in forestry, ecology and natural resources to develop their understanding of forest stand dynamics. The exercise involves measurement of key tree growth parameters in four even-aged, single-species plantation stands of different age but occupying sites with similar soil…

The notion of environmental awareness has been controversial in environmental literacy. Environmental awareness has been traditionally understood as conceptual awareness, but this study takes into consideration activity-related aspects of awareness, which should be integrated into an ontological model of developing environmental literacy. The…

This article reports on a study investigating the role of the local community in achieving the objectives of Education for Sustainable Development in Cyprus. The data presented was collected from 21 teachers who participated in a nationwide, exploratory research program aiming at offering them training in implementing environmental projects based…

In Australia there has been a rapid move to an acceptance of education for sustainability as mainstream environmental education. We argue that education for sustainability, with its platform of assisting individuals in making apparently informed decisions to create a more sustainable world, is at some distance from promoting more ethically-based…

Charles Dickens lived during the best and worst of times in 19th century England. His writings were greatly influenced by the ongoing industrial revolution. He described abhorrent environmental conditions, inadequate sanitary practices, child abuse, and other social maladies of the times. By bringing Charles Dickens into the biology classroom,…

According to Freeman Dyson, an emeritus professor of physics at the Institute for Advanced Study, the debate about global warming has become too narrow and opinions have become too entrenched. Relying on a computer model designed by the Yale University economist William D. Nordhaus, Dyson compared the effectiveness and economic feasibility of…

In order to help middle school students understand the many aspects that go into making decisions about environmental issues and concerns, as well as identifying the players involved in these decisions, an environmental town meeting activity was developed by the author. It includes opportunities to learn how the viewpoints of environmental…

The Oregon 4-H Wildlife Stewards program has been training teachers and volunteers to convert school grounds to education sites by constructing schoolyard wildlife habitats since 1997. The publication "What Can We Learn at the Pond? 4-H Wildlife Stewards Master Leader Guide" (Bourdeau 2004a) was written to support the program's focus on developing…

Professional teaching associations in Australia and abroad have been developing teacher and/or teaching standards and associated professional learning and assessment models in the key discipline areas since the 1990s. In Australia, a specific intent of this approach is to capture and recognise the depth and range of accomplished educators'…

The purpose of the study is to assess the awareness and attitudes of student teachers in Turkey. The relationship between the student teachers' attitudes and their gender, academic major, grade level, geographical region and socioeconomic status (level of family income, their parents' education level and occupation, residence) was evaluated with…

Even if one does not believe--and it is getting increasingly difficult not to--that the "green revolution" on college campuses is akin to the great movements for social change that rocked universities in the 1960s and '70s, there is no denying that it has taken root in such a way that no campus administrator can afford to ignore it. And unlike the…

Given the complexity of current social structures and environmental problems, attaining a truly sustainable society seems rather improbable today. Not only has society not been planned for the complexity of the preconditions and effects that sustainability entails, sustainability is also unlikely given current individual consumption patterns,…

This article describes how community colleges, as educational institutions, play a central role in the sustainability movement and in the battle against climate change. Across the country, two-year institutions are creating sustainability programs, such as recycling garbage or composting food waste. They are building new green buildings, upgrading…

This paper reports on a national evaluation project that investigated characteristics of environmental education (EE) practice in New Zealand schools in 2002-2003. The research included a review of New Zealand and international environmental education literature, a survey of nearly 200 New Zealand schools and case studies of environmental…