Tomorrow today; 2010 - unesdoc - Unesco

Image: Paulo Freire InstituteSeeds Groups: exercising citizenship from childhoodlishment of a concrete strategy so that we can start this debateinside our schools to build an eco-audit in order to discoverwhere exactly we are being unsustainable. It is very simple: allwe need to do is trace everything we do and compare this data tothe principles of sustainability. It is not hard to identify wherewe are and where we are not integrating these principles in ourcurriculum – in history, in social sciences and in our daily lives.In terms of the level of teaching and learning, we have to adoptdifferent strategies. In primary schools, for example, our childrenneed to experience the effects of sustainability first hand – theyneed to know plants’ and animals’ needs and habitats; how toreduce, reuse and recycle materials that have been used. On a moreadvanced level, we can discuss biodiversity, environmental conservation,energy alternatives and global warming. At university level,besides diffusing environmental information, we can disseminatenew information and conduct related research.ESD should have a school approach, like the Eco-School andideally, Sustainable School practices that have been developed inmany countries. Apart from building environmental awareness andpositive environmental attitudes and values, ESD also needs to bereflected across school life: not just in the classroom but outside ofit too. We cannot teach students about energy conservation in theirscience classes, if the schools are not doing anything toreduce energy consumption themselves. Environmentalawareness is necessary, but it is not enough. We mustset a good example ourselves.A curriculum that promotes ESD must continuouslybe reviewed to address new environmental,social and economic issues, and determine how theycan be tackled at a local level and more broadly. Issueslike climate change, sustainable consumption, humanrights, living values and food security also need to beintegrated in formal curricula as well as in non-formalsettings. Schools need to identify local issues andfind out how they can be dealt with through schoolbasedprogrammes. The entire community needs to beinvolved to make initiatives like this work – not onlystudents and teaching staff, but also school managers,non-teaching staff, and local organizations and communitygroups that work with the school. Perhaps mostimportant of all, ESD needs the support of local authorities,especially Ministries of Education, to ensure thatprogrammes will then be incorporated into the formaleducational system.[ 158 ]