The history of environmental formal education in Iran: Environment in textbooks of the 1370s/1990s and 1380/2000s

Abstract

This article uses a quantitative content analysis of fifth grade elementary school and third grade of middle school textbooks from the 1370s/1990s and 1380s/2000s in an attemp to show the contribution of the environment and its protection in textbooks and subsequently in formal education. In addition, this article tries to find out what factors influenced the thinking of curriculum planners and textbook authors. The results of the study show that only two percent of the total text content of the books deals with environmental protection. Of the threefold levels of knowledge, attitude and skills in these books, 78% are at the knowledge level. Furthermore, the largest amount of environmental data is found in books such as Geography, Experimental Science and Technology & Occupation. This could be an indication of the dominance of experimental thinking in the eyes of curriculum designers in the field of environmental education. However, it seems that in the 1380s, the textbooks paid more attention to the level of attitude, so that it increased from 2% in the 1370s to 4% in the 1380s. Moreover, in the 1380s, the dominance of experimental thinking seems to have decreased and environmentalism was included in non-experimental books such as Farsi and religious teachings. In addition, in the 1380s, textbooks paid more attention to pollution and the impact of polluting human activities on the environment than in the previous two decades.

Keywords

• environmental education
• formal education
• knowledge
• attitude
• skill
• 1990s and 2000s