Environmental Education to Realize “Active Learning”

- From the Viewpoint of Higher Education -

Abstract

  This paper aims to discuss what the environmental education (EE) community can offer to facilitate “Active Learning” in EE in higher education, and higher education in general. Before such discussion, the paper reviews the recent move by the Japanese government to facilitate an interactive learner- centered approach in higher education, which has thus far been dominated by a one-way knowledge infusion approach, to meet the rapid changes in socio-economic conditions and the universalization of higher education. While EE is implemented in various fields by various university faculties, most of the practices have not yet applied a leaner-centered approach. Based on accumulated discussions and practices in the EE community, this paper stresses the importance of “deep” learning through “deep” dialogues among people who hold different worldviews regarding sustainability, as well as student participation in designing their own learning process to empower them as active citizens.