This study presents an attempt to contribute to the field of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) by conceptualizing systems thinking skills of four- to six-year-old preschool children with the role of age in this particular skill. For this purpose, we developed and tested a method and instruments to assess and conceptualize systems thinking skills of 52 preschool children in early childhood education contexts from Turkey and Germany. By employing qualitative case study research, we concluded that the young children showed some signs of complex understanding regarding systems thinking in terms of detecting obvious gradual changes and two-step domino and/or multiple one-way causalities, as well as describing behavior of a balancing loop. However, their capacity was found to be limited when it comes to detecting a reinforcing loop, understanding system mechanisms by acknowledging the unintended consequences, detecting hidden components and processes, demonstrating multi-dimensional perspective, solving problems through high-leverage interventions, and predicting the future behavior of the system. Age had a notable effect on the total systems thinking mean scores of the participants.
The new generation spend a considerable amount of their time in formal education settings. Only a small fraction of this time is allocated to equipping children with the ability to deal with sustainability issues and so empowering them to respond to the key challenges of our time. Systems thinking (ST) has been promoted as a way of responding to these challenges by facilitating the understanding of complex dilemmas and mitigating them. The aim of this multiple case study is to shed light on the impact of early childhood education (ECE) settings on the ST skills of preschool children aged between four and six. For this purpose, we developed a strategy and instruments to determine ECE setting variables that could potentially be taken into consideration in ST education. We applied this methodology to contrasting cases from Turkey and Germany. The findings have important implications for policy makers, researchers and ECE teachers.
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