Sustainability Curricula Directory
Do your students know what their “ecological footprint” is? Do you know how to teach them what it is? The fourth pillar of The Green Schools Initiative's approach to school greening is “Teach, Learn, Engage!” (learn more about the 4 Pillars of a Green School). We offer ideas for curricula that will help mobilize students’ critical thinking and creativity for solving sustainability problems at school, at home, and around the world. Teachers: there is no need to reinvent the wheel!
Sadly, we are generally not preparing our students to handle the environmental and health legacies that we will be leaving them. While states have standards for math and science curricula, most states have not adopted specific environmental education standards, resulting in a grab bag of excellent to dismal programs, and funding for these programs is certainly inadequate (read "Teach, Learn, Engage!" for an evaluation of environmental education programs and key elements of effective programs).
The good news is that hands-on, experiential learning – often incorporated into environmental education, science, social studies, or global issues curricula – is shown to improve student achievement, increase critical-thinking skills, nurture children’s natural affinity to “do good,” and ultimately contribute to happier adults who are more engaged in their communities! At Green Schools Initiative, we have been working to compile some of the best teaching tools and make them more widely known to educators. In the Directory below we list some of the amazing resources that already exist to help you get started.
- Download the Sustainability Curricula Directory