Educating for Sustainability impact

Gaining a Masters in Educating for Sustainability from Antioch University, New England has had a profound impact on my thinking. Having a chance to interact and learn from Tom Wessels, David Sobel, Susan Dreyer Leon, Sue Gentile, Paul Bocko and Tom Julius among many others is a privilege. The summer of 2012, I spent in Keene is sketched all over my being. Secretly I never wanted that time to end. I wanted to go for forest walks everyday with Tom Wessels and just wanted to sit among my peers and teachers and absorb every bit of their intelligence and wisdom.

As I think Educating for sustainabilty several words come to mind.
Place based education, environment, economy, society, community, equity, nature, love of learning, civic engagement, child study, connections, self-organization, real time learning, practical, student centered, inquiry, stewardship, balance, systems, limits to growth, relationships, caring, love, interdependence, inhabitant etc - I think you get the picture.

As I consciously integrate our natural environment in my classroom lessons, I observe that students are becoming more appreciative of their natural world in which they live. Learning about the natural world like the river, eco-systems and their dwelling place is increasing their sense of place, self-identity, regional pride and conservation ethic. Similarly not only I feel this way, but magically as we live here longer and connect more to the community, my daughters have begun to take in this place with more patience, humility and attention to the smaller details.  Recently I read them the chapter on 'Indian Pedagogy.....' by Malcolm Margolin who writes about his commitment to the preservation of tradition from a place based perspective.

For sure this commitment only comes from loving a place and then understanding the needs of the place and then being engaged as a citizen. To understand place based, civic engagement and service learning I reasearched and created ths comparison table. It is beginning to dawn clearly that one leads to another, have a look and share your thoughts:

Place-based Learning Place-based learning is an educational approach that uses all aspects of the local environment, including local cultural, historical, and socio-political situations and the natural and built environment, as the integrating context for learning. In its most developed forms, it includes a clear focus on learning through civic engagement and participation in service projects of obvious relevance to the local school and community.

Civic Engagement Civic engagement promotes civic knowledge, responsibility, and participation in individual and collective actions in support of the stewardship of community natural and cultural resources, and the resolution of issues of public concern. Youth civic engagement generally involves youth in identifying appropriate projects. Civic engagement is most effective when it builds on the foundation developed through place-based learning.

Service Learning Service learning is a method whereby students learn and develop through active participation in a thoughtfully organized service that is conducted in and meets the needs of a community while also meeting the students’ educational objectives. While service learning is an important component of PBL, not all service-learning projects are grounded in local PBL experiences.