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Integrating sustainable development into the curriculum
There are some good examples of where FE providers are delivering sustainable development learning within the formal curriculum that you can use. For example, in a recent LSC funded study :
Some FE colleges have also undertaken specific measures such as: 16
Understanding where you are now and where you want to be is important. It will help to identify where you need to focus your attention. Sustainable development is a journey with no easily definable endpoint. This reflects the complexity of putting principles into practice. At all points in your journey you will inevitably keep asking questions. Use good practice (see the box below) and share your own wherever possible as this will help you to advance. Understanding this dynamic process will help make curriculum change easier to understand and achieve. Each organisation will have different approaches to the ways in which they communicate and make decisions about their curriculum. Each organisation will have written plans and policies that articulate their mission and values and the way they operate. By including sustainable development principles within these plans and policies the organisation signals its intention to address elements of sustainable development in all aspects of its activities and decision-making.
Will all this fit with your core discipline/vocational area and their aims? How will it fit into economics, business studies, art and design courses, English, and the like?
The integration of sustainable development principles into any existing teaching programme will be a learning process in itself. Try to make the connections between specific local circumstances – e.g. an environmentally damaging planning application or site of special scientific interest, or a local author or poet’s reflections on some local amenity (it could be the campus), as well as the wider global picture. Subject knowledge should be more open to alternative technology (tools, institutions and ideas) that may enable us to live within ecological limits, and citizenship programmes could explore alternative forms of citizenship and democracy. Above all subject knowledge should be developed in the context of the everyday issues that affect learner’s lives and could be applied and evaluated in community projects that seek more sustainable ways of living.
Such reform of subject knowledge is likely to require changed thinking on the part of teachers, lecturers and training providers. The table below is a useful guide with key questions to prompt such thinking and ensure that lessons become more effective vehicles for sustainable development. It suggests that what is needed is not so much new curriculum or lesson content but a revised and extended approach that presents content in a changed context.
Based on Webster, 2001
Clearly every lesson will not offer the same scope to cover the sustainable development agenda. But this process is a systematic way of evaluating opportunities to introduce sustainable development into your learning programmes.
Useful RESOURCES:
The National College for School Leadership (NCSL)
Sustainable Schools area of TeacherNet (external website)
- 60% of colleges provided examples of sustainable learning taking place within the formal curriculum.
- Courses in which sustainable development forms part of the curriculum were identified as: Construction; Design Technology; Electrical engineering; ESOL (English as a Second Language); Fashion; Horticulture; Hospitality; Health and Safety Units of all courses; Motor vehicle courses; PHSE (Personal Health and Social Education); Religious education; Sport and recreation; Travel and Tourism.
Some FE colleges have also undertaken specific measures such as: 16
- One college’s environmental policy requires curriculum staff to promote sustainable development to learners, and encourage them to take a responsible attitude towards protecting the environment.
- An example of ‘teaching for and through’ as opposed to ‘about’ sustainable development occurs at one college, where the Principal described the Egan Review on Skills for Sustainable Communities as a driver behind the college’s introduction of the wider key skills to most 16-18 courses.
Understanding where you are now and where you want to be is important. It will help to identify where you need to focus your attention. Sustainable development is a journey with no easily definable endpoint. This reflects the complexity of putting principles into practice. At all points in your journey you will inevitably keep asking questions. Use good practice (see the box below) and share your own wherever possible as this will help you to advance. Understanding this dynamic process will help make curriculum change easier to understand and achieve. Each organisation will have different approaches to the ways in which they communicate and make decisions about their curriculum. Each organisation will have written plans and policies that articulate their mission and values and the way they operate. By including sustainable development principles within these plans and policies the organisation signals its intention to address elements of sustainable development in all aspects of its activities and decision-making.
Will all this fit with your core discipline/vocational area and their aims? How will it fit into economics, business studies, art and design courses, English, and the like?
The integration of sustainable development principles into any existing teaching programme will be a learning process in itself. Try to make the connections between specific local circumstances – e.g. an environmentally damaging planning application or site of special scientific interest, or a local author or poet’s reflections on some local amenity (it could be the campus), as well as the wider global picture. Subject knowledge should be more open to alternative technology (tools, institutions and ideas) that may enable us to live within ecological limits, and citizenship programmes could explore alternative forms of citizenship and democracy. Above all subject knowledge should be developed in the context of the everyday issues that affect learner’s lives and could be applied and evaluated in community projects that seek more sustainable ways of living.
Such reform of subject knowledge is likely to require changed thinking on the part of teachers, lecturers and training providers. The table below is a useful guide with key questions to prompt such thinking and ensure that lessons become more effective vehicles for sustainable development. It suggests that what is needed is not so much new curriculum or lesson content but a revised and extended approach that presents content in a changed context.
| KEY QUESTION | CHANGED THINKING |
| Is there a sustainable development context that I can use in this lesson? If so, does my lesson tackle the multi-dimensional nature of sustainable development? Does it tackle causes and solutions as well as symptoms of unsustainable activities e.g. waste, pollution, poverty? | Think bigger picture – include the seven concepts of sustainable development or other approaches. Think causes and solutions as well as symptoms. |
| Is my lesson FUTURE orientated? Do learners get to consider probable and preferable futures? | Think sustainability long term. |
| Does my lesson feature viable SOLUTIONS? Do some solutions demand less from the environment and allow access to more people? | Think sufficiency, resource efficiency, waste reduction. Think alternative technology. Think alternative economies of time and social welfare. Think social and environmental justice. |
| What is needed to achieve sustainable solutions? Does my lesson feature opportunities for CHANGE? | Think technology, beliefs and behaviour, prices, markets, laws, regulation, planning, social welfare, media, lifestyles. |
| Where are the most effective opportunities for change located? Is my lesson realistic about POWER and SOCIAL CHANGE STRATEGIES? | Think individual, community, business, government and media at different scales (locally, nationally, regionally and globally). |
| Do solutions promote IDENTITY, DEMOCRACY and active and critical CITIZENSHIP? | Think rights of present and future generations and the rest of nature. Think environmental citizenship. Think how education can empower people to realise their common interest in sustainable development together with more fulfilling lives and identities |
Clearly every lesson will not offer the same scope to cover the sustainable development agenda. But this process is a systematic way of evaluating opportunities to introduce sustainable development into your learning programmes.
Useful RESOURCES:
The National College for School Leadership (NCSL)
Sustainable Schools area of TeacherNet (external website)
