Term
Summer 2022
Capstone
Capstone Project
Degree Name
MALED
Facilitator(s)
Patty Born
Content Expert
Anne Sabby
Abstract
For there to be solutions to environmental issues people of diverse perspectives need to be able to critically think and collaborate together to work through possible solutions. Historically, environmental education has been missing many voices from the BIPOC communities in finding creative solutions to environmental issues. This Capstone Project had the driving question of, Can increasing diversity in environmental education improve students' environmental literacy? The literature reviewed showed that environmental education cannot be a stand alone curriculum. Instead, it needs to be a multidisciplinary approach to the curriculum that allows students to critically think about real world issues that society is facing. Besides making environmental education a multidisciplinary curriculum there needs to be a connection to multicultural education at the same time. If students see professionals like them participating in environmental education activities they are more likely to participate. Before students can participate in multicultural, multidisciplinary environmental education teachers need to be able to design effective, meaningful and constructive curriculum to support the needs of their students. This Capstone Project created three professional development opportunities for teachers to reflect on their own social justice understanding, time to create meaningful curriculum that connects environmental concepts to their daily lessons, and a time for educators to share their findings and reflect on the environmental education focus lesson being taught. Everyone has a connection with nature, but in order for environmental issues to be solved diverse perspectives need to be applied and communities need an opportunity to have a strong environmentally literate society.
Project Type
Professional Development
Keywords
Curriculum, Environmental Studies, Science, Staff Development
Recommended Citation
Nordberg, Nathaniel, "How Using Multidisciplinary Approaches To Mainstream Education Can Increase Diversity In Environmental Education And Improve Students’ Environmental Literacy" (2022). School of Education and Leadership Student Capstone Projects. 839.
https://digitalcommons.hamline.edu/hse_cp/839
dc_type
text
dc_publisher
DigitalCommons@Hamline
dc_format
application/pdf
dc_source
School of Education Student Capstone Projects