Education for sustainable development (ESD) in early childhood education has limited research and theory to guide related practice. The goal of this research was to develop a procedural framework for the implementation of teacher professional development opportunities in education for sustainable development at an early stage.
The first phase of this research consisted of a systematic literature review focusing on how research defines and describes the implementation of ESD in early childhood education. Thirty peer-reviewed articles published between 2003 and 2019 were identified and reviewed. A draft report outlining the main contents, skills, attitudes and values related to ESD was developed. During the second phase of this research, an international team of practitioners reviewed the report. This process led to the identification of three emerging categories, which were then adopted as cornerstones for ESD activities in early childhood education. These cornerstones call for ESD activities to be (1) action-integrative, meaning they should encourage practical activities that integrate scientific and non-scientific knowledge; (2) community-based, and encourage relevant activities with transformative goals; and (3) value-oriented, with a large enough scope to develop ethics and aesthetics attitudes regarding humans and non-humans. In addition to being accepted by the review team, these three cornerstones were also present in almost half of the articles reviewed. Three main pedagogical approaches consistent with these cornerstones were identified: art-based, outdoor-based, and project-problem-based.
The third phase of this research involved a review of 26 additional studies. This review focused on the ESD cornerstones and the specific pedagogical approaches. During the fourth phase of this research, two expert reviewers conducted a coding and content analysis to check the inclusion of the six categories in all 56 of the articles reviewed. Once these six categories were validated, they became the framework for the implementation of teacher professional development opportunities for ESD in early childhood education. Each component of this framework relates in some way to helping children become change-agents in their community. As this research indicates, promoting agency in young children is of major importance for education for sustainable development.
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