EURO-ECO 2010 Hanover 2 - 3 Dezember 2010	Environmental, Engineering - Economic and Legal Aspects for Sustainable Living
	European Academy of Natural Sciences, Hanover European Scientific Society, Hanover University of Bremen, Bremen

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The 2005 UNECE Strategy for Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and the Bonn Declaration (UNESCO World Conference on ESD, April 2009) indicate the need for restructuring the education system, which should contribute to the development of critical and creative thinking skills among the wide population. ESD is a special form of interdisciplinary learning, covering virtually all subject areas of the natural sciences, humanities and engineering sciences. Such wide coverage should be delivered not only by means of examining and finding solutions for environmental problems, but also through the use of new educational technologies involving problem-based research and creative learning activities.

The traditional form of organising the learning process in higher educational institutions in our country is a combination of lectures and seminars, based on simple transfer of knowledge (the information reproduction method). However, professional higher environmental education requires the use of other teaching forms and methods, as its primary objective is to develop the students’ creative capacity that will help them to solve complex problems in their professional field. How can this be achieved?

Years of experience with students of environmental majors show that students should be introduced into the basics of professional competence starting with the first year of study. This includes adjusting teaching methods in individual disciplines and defining research objectives. One way to do this is by increasing the share of time allocated for students’ self-study and by making all assigments individual, thus increasing each student’s personal responsibility.

The most successful forms of instruction in environmental education include:

• Problem-based lectures;
• Seminars based on the use of various methods and approaches (small group work, group discussion with decision-making, case study examination, debates, work with visual aids, video and audio recordings, etc.);
• Laboratory-based practical assignments;
• Field trips (nature sites, museums, businesses, municipal bodies, etc.);
• Learning games, including role playing and simulations;
• Shared projects;
• Peer education (or mutual help).

Many forms of learning can be interactive, but that means educators need to make sufficient effort in developing detailed plans for each learning session and in combining different methods during these sessions. Most importantly, during the sessions students should be encouraged to speak their minds, to ask questions, and to look for answers. The ability to formulate a question is the first step towards understanding the problem. The task of the teacher is to place each student in such an environment that will stimulate him/her to reason, compare and draw conclusions. The best way to do this is by searching for practical sloutions in the learning process, i.e. looking at situations that can be encountered in real life.

Education for sustainable development offers a chance to revise the established traditions in education, including its forms and methods, and allows for improving the quality of the learning process. This implies not just a transition to a “subject – subject” relationship between educators and students, but a change towards cogeneration of a learning environment that offers new opportunities for each individual.

 

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