Environmental education is often taught as science. But many teachers, especially in the arts and humanities, wonder how they can bring environmental issues into their own subjects. Could art, literature and time outdoors help teachers understand environmental issues more deeply and teach them in new ways?
The course was built on two ideas. The first was teaching the whole person: body, feelings and thoughts, not just the mind (the authors call this "holism"). The second was caring for people and nature together and seeing them as connected (they call this "ecohumanism"). The two instructors studied work from 24 teachers, mostly women, who teach kindergarten through grade 12 in many subjects. Teachers worked in a classroom, a city park, an office tower, a museum and online.
What they found:
- Looking closely at ordinary places. Small groups rode to the 29th floor of a 36-story office tower and explored other floors, after reading a short story that makes climbing stairs feel strange. They took photos and videos, wrote poems and danced. About a third of their products combined art, observation and reflection. One group described stale stairwells, construction noise and lobbies without plants, and a sea view blocked by towers.
- The outdoors pulled toward the concrete. In a small city park, pairs wandered silently, then each drew "environmental education." Most drew realistic scenes, such as plants between buildings, and almost none showed teaching. A few drew abstract ideas. One teacher crumpled a blank page to show the care needed in changing our surroundings. Others drew slowing down as part of environmental education.
- Final projects were richer. Working alone or in small groups, teachers combined art forms such as sculpture, dance, video, music and poetry. They tackled topics like waste in the fashion industry, overconsumption, noise and waste management, and often called for personal change. One group posed on a desert sculpture, echoing a dancer's work about bodies in city spaces. Community issues appeared only a little.
- Bodies and feelings mattered. Walking, climbing and noticing bodily sensations showed up in many products.
- It takes time. Some teachers found this way of learning hard. The instructors felt one semester was too short.
What this means for your practice:
Start with places people pass every day. You don't need wilderness. An office building or a small city park gave teachers plenty to notice and question.
Make time for silence. Silent wandering and quiet observation before creating helped teachers notice more, including their own feelings and sensations.
Pair art with words. Ask learners to explain their drawing, photo or video in writing. The explanations revealed what learners understood.
Watch the pull of the concrete. If you want learners to think about big ideas, being outdoors may keep them focused on what they see. Vary the settings, and leave at least one task open so learners can think more broadly.
Invite the body and feelings in. Ask what learners felt, heard, smelled or sensed, not just what they thought.
End with action. A final project that asks for a personal or community step helped teachers move from noticing to doing.
Allow enough time. This approach builds over weeks. Plan for more than one short unit if you can.
Mix the arts and the sciences. The researchers recommend bringing these approaches into teacher training and schools. Their course paired an environmental educator with a literature scholar.
The Bottom Line
The two instructors analyzed artwork, photos, videos and writing from 24 teachers in their course, from early activities to final projects. Early on, the teachers recorded what they noticed around them: stale air, noise, waste, crowding and missing green space. When asked to draw "environmental education" outdoors, most simply drew the city scene in front of them, and few connected it to teaching. By the final project, the teachers mixed art forms, linked several environmental and community issues, and often called for action such as slowing down, buying less or reusing. Being outdoors opened their eyes but also kept them focused on what they could see. For educators, the study suggests that outdoor experience, art and quiet reflection, used across varied settings and over time, can deepen how people understand and express environmental issues.