Globalizing Environmental Education: What's Language Got to Do with it?

Avery

2021

Sustainability

Despite continued efforts by educators, UN declarations and numerous international agreements, progress is still limited in handling major global challenges such as ecosystem collapse, accelerating climate change, poverty, and inequity. The capacity to collaborate globally on addressing these issues remains weak. This historical review of research on global learning for sustainable development (GLSD) aims to clarify the diverse directions that research on GLSD has taken, to present the historical development of the research area, and highlight emerging research issues. The review summarizes key findings of 53 peer-reviewed publications, published in English in the period 1994–2020 identified with the search terms “global learning” and “sustainable development”, sustainability or GLSD, respectively. The review documented a gradually growing knowledge base, mostly authored by scholars located in the global North. Conclusions point to what we might achieve if we could learn from one another in new ways, moving beyond Northern-centric paradigms. It is also time to re-evaluate core assumptions that underlie education for sustainable development more generally, such as a narrow focus on formal learning institutions. The review provides a benchmark for future reviews of research on GLSD, reveals the emerging transformative structure of this transdisciplinary field, and offers reference points for further research.

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Already in the 1990s, critical voices such as Gough [125] pointed to the effects of an unequal global landscape on environmental education. Several decades later, these concerns are still warranted.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Global Learning for Sustainable Development: A Historical Review

Avery

2021

Sustainability

“…However, the original UNEP programme was also criticised for perpetuating a neocolonialist discourse in environmental education (Greenall Gough, 1993), rather than promoting genuine international cooperation among its participants.…”

Section: Critiques Of Global Educationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Learning and teaching sustainable development in global–local contexts

Environmental Education Research

2016

The overall aim of this thesis is to develop knowledge of teaching and learning sustainable development in global-local contexts. The research field is global learning for sustainable development (GLSD). Phenomenographic approach and contextual analysis were used as methods of analysis, and data was collected by Semi-structured interviews at secondary and upper secondary schools in Sweden.In Study I, a strategic and systematic literature review was conducted of recent trends and critique to the dominating rhetoric on policy level concerning global education and global learning on sustainability issues. The complexity represented in GLSD is of global interest to face current challenges. The global-local context and the process for global learning were characterised by the learner's perspective and self-efficacy. The variation of ways in which contextual features were revealed, affected how participants experienced their own learning global learning space.In Study II, empirical investigations were conducted of students', teachers', and head teachers' conceptions of implementation of GLSD. Results indicate that critical knowledge capabilities were needed to act towards sustainability globally. Critical knowledge capabilities developed in the processes were to take command and collaborate as a team. Capabilities that were identified as necessary but which had not been sufficiently developed were to be prepared, act in a transdisciplinary manner and lead for holistic understanding in the learning process. Critical knowledge capabilities to handle complex knowledge were characterised by volition, self-directed learning, and knowledge formation. 6In Study III, a re-analysis was conducted of the data from Study II. The results shed light on pertinent transition skills in GLSD: (I) transdisciplinary action via knowledge formation in actual practices, (II) democratic collaborative action via processes of understanding, respectively (III) self-directed learning and independent initiative. These transition skills, enabling young people to be prepared for unpredictable changes, were perceived as key features in developing young people's capability in an uncertain world. They developed worldview understanding, and advanced transformation competencies including critical reflections upon questions of current normativity.In Study IV, collaborative and transdisciplinary teaching with a global-local perspective was investigated in a study with teachers committed to global learning and sustainable development at an upper secondary school. Two main transdisciplinary teaching approaches of GLSD were distinguished: Contributing: Assist and Take Part respectively Ownership: Possess and Reconceptualise. The contributing approach was divided into the sub-categories: (I) Disheartened, (II) Supportive, and (III) Complementing teaching approaches; while the ownership approach comprised (IV) Decisive, and (V) Multi-dimensional teaching approaches.Various dimensions of the results appeared to be relevant for sustainability teaching an...

“…Already as early as 1974, an international environmental education programme sponsored by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) sought to promote educational action, based on concerns about the quality of the global environment. However, the original UNEP programme was also criticised for perpetuating a neocolonialist discourse in environmental education (Greenall Gough, 1993), rather than promoting genuine international cooperation among its participants.…”

Section: Critiques Of Global Educationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sustainable Development Through Global Learning and Teaching

Handbook of Sustainability Management

Anderberg

2012

Purposeto provide a synopsis of some major trends that have marked discussions on global learning for sustainable development (GLSD) in higher education. The aim is formulated against the background of the complexity represented in GLSD, as well as the fact that sustainable development (SD) is an issue of global interest for universities. Design/methodology/approach-The authors conducted an overview in recent trends in research on GLSD in higher education over the last 20 years, based on the combination of the keyword higher education for sustainable development with global learning and global education. Findings-The overview suggests that only relatively limited steps have been implemented to achieve GLSD, and rhetoric still dominates the discussions. It appears that little empirical research has been undertaken on learning in global settings. Several authors have identified the need for a competence-based curriculum for GLSD, Originality/value-Universities, professionals and students need to take greater responsibility. How knowledge, values and abilities are formed and developed from the global learner's perspective therefore remains an open and fundamental question. The article underlines the crucial role that higher education plays in global learning for sustainability.