What does it mean to engage in critical pedagogy of place in formal science education? Although Gruenewald's (2003a) theoretical construct of a critical pedagogy of place has been heavily cited, there is nonetheless a lack of empirical research on critical pedagogy of place, particularly within formal science education. This paper provides a case…

The Honors Living-Learning Community (HLLC) at Rutgers University--Newark is an initiative that is expanding traditional notions of honors and transforming the Rutgers--Newark community. The HLLC promotes academic excellence, community engagement, and social equity. It seeks to eradicate structural barriers while critiquing deficit-based…

The concept of "connectedness with nature" is increasingly used in environmental and sustainability discourse. However, this construct has also been critiqued and proponents charged with harboring an ambivalence that paradoxically reinforces a sense of separation from "nature". We respond to one critique by demonstrating that…

Indigenous education and philosophy are rooted in the concept of "relationality" -- the relatedness of all things -- within the framework of place-based experiences and knowledge. This article focuses on tribal colleges and universities (TCUs) in the United States -- in particular, on their dedication to land use and preservation,…

Driven 2 Teach is a privately funded program for history teachers in the state of Utah. The program emphasizes the importance of teacher travel to educate history teachers in the places where history happened. This study investigated the program's influence on participant gains in learning about history and how to best teach about the past, social…

Despite decades of formal work with teachers, little is known about what they gain from professional development at and with historic sites. This article presents the first data-set from a 3-year Institute for Museum and Library Services National Leadership Grant project designed to develop a broad-based assessment for understanding what teachers…

The authors share a narrative of planning and implementing a Nature Kindergarten in the public school system in British Columbia, Canada. Inspired by similar programs in Northern Europe, the Nature Kindergarten became the first program of its kind in Western Canada. The importance of developing pedagogical principles, understanding local context…

In response to a paper calling for the re-engagement of agricultural education with the sciences and science education, this essay is supportive but argues to proceed with caution: one that at first does no harm. I offer a supplementary lens and story of change at Cornell University as a cautionary and motivational tale. I concur with the authors…

The article draws on qualitative research from reflective journals of a group of university students based on their experiences from a month-long outdoor and environmental education journey in the Canadian Rockies. The article is concerned with the stories that are communicated through an embodied engagement with place(s), particularly the Brazeau…

This case study describes how a high-poverty, linguistically and culturally diverse elementary school came to embed mindfulness in its curriculum and what adults perceived to be the outcomes of the program on students' well-being. This qualitative case study is based on 25 interviews with teachers, administrators, and community members; classroom…

In this dissertation, the author aims at gaining a better understanding of how taking an Environmental Literature and Writing course affects student writing while exploring how writing students view their own roles within their natural environments following the completion of the described course. Through the collecting and assessing of student…

Place-based pedagogy, the incorporation of local dynamics into the classroom as a step toward bridging the school-community gap, is becoming increasingly popular as educating for sustainability gains traction in schools. However, little attention has been paid to the role Appalachia has played in creating our modern sense of place-based pedagogy…

The contemporary theory of learning treats pre-school instruction as the first level of early child education. The pre-school age is seen as a very important period of life. A pre-school child grasps knowledge spontaneously, naturally, in all circumstances, thus, direct learning seems to be of particular importance. It may therefore seem that…

This study investigates innovative ways that outdoor educators can actively promote young participants' authentic voice in educational research and, in turn, increase our understanding of their worldview through accurately recording what children are seeing, hearing, doing, and touching when they are beyond our researcher's gaze. The study was…

Rivers2Lake helps teachers learn to provide watershed educational experiences for students through a summer institute followed by mentoring. Teacher focus groups were conducted to investigate the impact of mentoring, as well as toward understanding what was influential in bringing about those impacts. Mentoring impacted teachers in affective ways…