Performing Department
Human Ecology
Non Technical Summary
Environmental literacy among suburban Americans is said to be low. In response, personnel at public parks and greenspaces have worked to offer place-based programming that not only includes natural history but also environmental behavior and attitude change. Doing so, however, requires a thoughtful approach that targets not only normative but non-normative conceptions about the environment.This project will not only collect data that will help professionals effectively gear future programming but also will develop a program geared toward educators outside of the park setting. This project will help to establish a foundation of evidence-based practices that promote environmental literacy.
Animal Health Component
30%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
50%
Applied
30%
Developmental
20%
Goals / Objectives
2. Demonstrate and expand the evidence for the role of park and outdoor recreation services in promoting environmental literacy among youth, and document the long-term influences of early lifespan connections with nature.
3. Demonstrate and expand the evidence for the role of park and outdoor recreation services in promoting community vibrancy and resilience.
Project Methods
In the first phase, a thorough review of the literature on assessing environmental literacy of multiple populations will be conducted. This review will be used to develop an instrument and protocol for use with practicing educators. This development will focus on a) assessing the competencies component of environmental literacy and b) determining degree of environmental literacy, using Stables (1998) three-tier framework. We will also develop a Qualtrics tool to recruit educators to take an online environmental literacy assessment for the validation process. This tool will be used to assess environmental literacy of educators working with youth, students, and the public. The assessment, to be consistent with the social-ecological perspective, will contain scales for environmental knowledge (Roper, NEETF 200), environmental identity self-efficacy and novel scales for competencies and behavior.Hollweg, et al (2011) describe dispositions as encompassing environmental sensitivity, pro-environmental attitudes and worldview, and environmental concern as well as a sense of personal responsibility and intention to act and a sense of self-efficacy. This covers a lot of ground, yet in constructing an assessment tool, brevity is important to encourage high response rates. Therefore, it is key to use scales that address multiple aspects of the dispositions construct. Here I have taken an identity approach to dispositions. In contrast to attitudes, which are attached to specific items, ideas, or experiences, an identity is consistent within a person, yet applied in multiple contexts in nuanced ways (Stets & Biga, 2003).Teacher training programs will focus on the potential of greenspaces for influencing the multiple components of environmental literacy: attitudes and identities that lead to great attachment and empathy for the environment, great environmental knowledge, and motivation for pro-environmental behavior. In addition, place-based learning in these greenspaces offers opportunity for authentic learning experiences that develop the competencies of identifying environmental issues, identifying potential solutions and then selecting the best solution in context. Lastly, such experiences offer opportunities to develop and practice pro-environmental behavior.Data from the development and implementation of the instrument and educator trainings will then be used to create a report of best practices for using greenspaces to increase the environmental literacy of students and the public.