Children,environmental education,and the implications of changing from a liberal to a cultural/bio-conservative ideology

Abstract

The paper frames the discussion of children's education in terms of cultural charac teristics that appear to be shared by ecologically sustainable cultures. These charac teristics include cultural practices based on mythopoetic narratives that are "eco centric" rather than anthropocentric; an inclusive sense of community that extends the moral responsibility of humans to the rest of the biotic community; a sense of time where the past and future are sources of authority in the decision-making pro cesses of the present; and an ideological orientation that can best be described as cultural/bio-conservatism. The paper explores how these characteristics, essential to long-term sustainability, would lead to fundamental changes in the formative pro cesses of primary socialization of children, notions of intelligence and educational practices. The paper also explores how "progressive" ideas and values that have guided the education of children in recent decades encode cultural assumptions that have contributed to ecologically destructive forms of human progress.

Keywords

children educational philosophy environment sustainable development socialization.

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