Learning about sustainability in a self-organized learning environment

• In Event: Sustainability and peace

Proposal

Abstract
This research analyzed the construction of knowledge associated with environmental care and the development of competencies for sustainability within a Self-Organized Learning Environment (SOLE), where learning takes place in an autonomous and self-organized way, through inquiry, digital mediation and minimal instructional intervention. Among the aspects that were studied was the development of competencies for sustainability such as: critial thinking, collaboration, integrated problem solving and self-awarness; as well as the construction of conceptual knowledge about sustainability and care for the environment. The students' ability to understand and represent conceptual information, as well their competencies for sustainability, were assessed by analyzing the complexity, the veracity and congruence of a variety of learning products, as well as the pertinence and viability of solutions provided to specific problems associated with sustainability and environmental care.
This research involved low-income secondary school students, male and female, from a public school in Mexico City.

Keywords: Sustainability competencies, self-organization, inquiry learning, secondary education.

A Self Organized Learning Environment (SOLE) is a pedagogical scheme that uses information and communication technologies (ICTs) to access information in order to facilitate the construction of conceptual knowledge, solve specific problems, and develop learning skills, through inquiry learning and the analysis and synthesis of information (Mitra, 2003). This methodology was implemented in a low-income public secondary school in Mexico City with the objective of analyzing the construction and appropriation of competencies and concepts related to sustainability and the care for the environment within this learning conditions. This study presents an analysis of the learning experience and products that resulted from a SOLE intervention, that involved solving specific research questions, and finding a pertinent, viable and sustainable solution to a specific problem concerning environmental care within an educational community; as well as the students’ perceptions and perspectives regarding the attitudinal and cognitive competencies displayed during the SOLE sessions.
Self-organized learning environments have their origin in the educational experience known as: "A Hole in the Wall" (Mitra, 2003), which presented a didactics of minimal instructional intervention, where students were given the premise to self-organize and self-manage their learning in a collective way, without the explicit intervention of a teacher, and through the analysis and discrimination of information that they could investigate by making use of the Internet when solving a specific research question or problem. This educational proposal, suggests that young students have the ability of acquiring knowledge, skills, and specific competencies, by means of collaborative work and the strategic use of ICTs as mediation tools for acquiring information through inquiry. Additional investigations have assessed the appropriation and construction of knowledge without explicit or directed instruction through the use of ICTs (Chao Rebolledo & Díaz Barriga, 2014). Self-organized learning environments conceive learning processes from a socio-constructivist perspective, through an action of mediation, in which the construction of knowledge is understood as the relationship and interaction between an instructional tool (a computer connected to the Internet), a facilitator (instead of a content-transmitter teacher), and a group of students, who are active participants in a critical thinking and inquiry process. Within this type of educational environment, students are given the responsibility and management of their learning process without the need of explicit instruction; this, in turn, helps them to be aware of their actions and decisions (Mitra & Quiroga, 2012). Through the use of ICTs, students look for, analyze and come up with collective and creative solutions to particular questions and problems; solutions can be represented in graphic organizers, digital presentations, texts, collages, videos, or other specific learning products or objects.
Some of the research questions that were investigated by students include the following:
• What keeps living beings alive?
• How do living beings relate to each other for their survival?
• What happens to the garbage, or waste, that we generate?
• What kind of garbage is produced at our school?
• Can garbage stop being waste?
• What can we do with the garbage that we produce at school?

Given the particular characteristics of a SOLE, it was of general interest of this investigation to analyze the learning process in terms of the veracity, complexity, viability and pertinence of answers and solutions provided to specific problems and research questions associated with the concept of sustainability and environmental care. Since education for sustainability requires de combination of conceptual knowledge, skills, values and attitudes in order to generate committed and collaborative actions towards sustainability, it should favor learning environments that go beyond traditional learning schemes (based on information transmission and constricted instruction) and promote collaboration, critical thinking and problem solving, among other competencies associated to the education for sustainability (UNESCO, 2017). Therefore, assessing the development of such competencies within this particular learning environment was also paramount, since some of these competencies can be found in the general framework of a SOLE (for example: critical thinking, collaboration, integrated problem solving, among others).
A set of rubrics were designed to analyze the work produced during the learning sessions, in addition to a questionnaire that registered the students´ overall learning experience and perceptions.
From the results obtained through the rubrics, a quantitative descriptive analysis was carried out to assess conceptual knowledge about sustainability and care for the environment, the pertinence and viability of solutions given to the posed problems, and the development of competencies for sustainability. A qualitative analysis of the information provided by the questionnaire allowed further evaluation of the development of competencies for sustainability as perceived by the students.
Around 150 secondary students participated in this study, both male and female, from a public school in Mexico City, age 13 to 14 on average.

Authors

• cimenna chao rebolledo, Universidad Iberoamericana

• Carol Fabiola Penilla Becerra, Universidad Iberoamericana

• Rodrigo Salgado Delgado, Universidad Iberoamericana