engleski

Contribution to the analysis of preschool teacher and junior grade teacher style of educational work in the Republic of Croatia, with regard to the field of environment : current state assessments and implications

Education for environment and its related terms, such as education for ecological society, education for sustainable future and education for sustainable development, are the modern constructs that imply the efforts to be explained theoretically, examined and also distinguished. The majority of the past works have more or less resulted in (dis)agreeing findings about their relationship. This work gives an overview of the factors that have contributed to the development of more and more omnipresent education for environment and sustainable development, their challenges and the need for more universal research of the same factors, all in relation with teacher education. The overview of the basic theoretical determinations is followed by an emphasis put on the ambiguousness of educational models. What is particularly stressed here are the possibilities of their application in personal development as a teacher. The empiric part of the work is also a part of a wider research of the education of preschool teachers and primary school teachers in the Republic of Croatia. The aim of the research was: to contribute to the determination and comprehension of the different working styles of persons that professionally work in the system of preschool and primary school education, with regard to the field of environment ; to determine whether these persons differ in single indicators according to their educational profile ; and to determine to what extent the assessments of working in various segments of children / pupil education for environment contribute to the assessments of general professional development and satisfaction. Out of eight statement groups, the most positive assessed ones were the statements regarding the field of encouraging children / pupils for responsible and active behaviour in environment, the field of stressing the aim and purpose of learning about environment to children / pupils, and the field of freedom to create the curriculum of education for environment. The relatively low assessed statements were the ones regarding the field of cooperation with parents and the field of creating reports or information about environment. The results shown that there are smaller or larger differences between the groups of the examinees with different educational profile, relating to the style of their educational work with children / pupils in the field of environment. The junior grade teachers, as compared to the preschool teachers, assessed the style of their educational work with pupils in the field of environment by significantly higher scores. Looking at the whole, the given results witness that the educational work styles give a significant contribution to the explaination of the single components of education for environment and they also have a significant role in presenting the current state and perspectives of preschool teacher and junior grade teacher education for environment and sustainable development.

environment ; sustainable development ; education for environment / sustainable development ; children ; pupils ; preschool teachers ; junior grade teachers ; style of educational work.

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