2016 Volume 26 Issue 1 Pages 1_38-51
Learning about environmental problems that include human-wildlife conflict with international students could provide great opportunities for students to improve their understanding of the theme from a global perspective and to train themselves to potentially become global leaders in this field. The author conducted a study to understand the effects of a course entitled “Facilitating Nature Conservation in Our Society,” taught in English at Chiba University, Japan. Every class included lectures and group discussions. The author taught this course for one semester (i.e., a total of 15 classes) in which 12 students―7 from Japan, 2 from the US, and one each from Australia, Finland, and Thailand―attended. The contents included understanding the relationship between human society and the natural environment, the value of biodiversity, human-wildlife issues in Japan, and efforts to live in harmony with wildlife all over the world. Throughout the course, students were required to submit reports after each class. These reports, submitted by the 12 students, were reviewed to understand what students learned from the class and group discussions with other students from various countries. The author subjectively analyzed some reports and revealed that students 1) learned about similarities and differences of environmental issues all over the world, and 2) acquired communication skills such as how to reach a consensus with people from different cultural backgrounds. For example, an American student and a Finnish student felt the characteristics of wildlife issues in Japan were somewhat different from their countries. They addressed that interventions well used in their countries (i.e., the US and Finland) such as participatory monitoring of wildlife movement around cities and hunting could potentially mitigate the issues in Japan. Japanese students learned about the importance of actively stating their opinions in English in the group discussions and workshops in order to promote mutual understanding.
