Nature’s Classroom: Designing a Practical Environmental Education Curriculum

The world is currently facing a plethora of environmental catastrophes, and environmental education is a crucial tool for addressing this crisis. Environmental education (EE) programs, when included in formal primary schools, have been shown to create positive environmental changes and improve students’ academic performance, social-emotional learning, and physical health. However, teachers often face various barriers that impede their ability to implement EE programs in schools. This capstone combines three models for EE - place-based education, nature journaling, and community partnerships to address these barriers. The research question driving this project is: What factors do informal educators need to consider when developing environmental education curricula for use in formal primary education settings? Using the Understanding by Design framework (McTighe & Wiggins, 2004), a curriculum has been created to manifest the benefits and address the barriers. This project is a significant step towards developing practical environmental education programs for school implementation