Building Bridges Between Science Classrooms and Working Landscapes Through Collaborative Environmental Education Research

• In Event: Roundtable Session 3
  In Roundtable Session: Environmental Learning, Knowing, and Action-Competence in Children and Youth

Abstract

Environmental action in combination with reflection about relevant scientific concepts has the potential to develop students' action-competence for environmental problem-solving. Using quantitative and qualitative methods, we investigated the impacts of students' completing science writing prompts before and after each of 5 watershed restoration field days. We found that while understanding of ecological concepts improved only marginally, according to quantitative measures, qualitative analysis of their writing and interviews revealed that prepartory writing prompts improved their understanding and confidence about the science content. Most importantly, students' stewardship attitudes were significantly impacted from pre- to post-field day writing responses and over the course of the 5 field days, indicating that comined restoration experiences and reflective writing about science may improve students' action-competence.

Authors

• Heidi L. Ballard, University of California - Davis

• Erin Hardie, University of California - Davis