Personally, and for the purposes of this study, I hold sustainable development to be the cultivation of positive attitudes, skills, values and practices that have the capability to foster peaceful and harmonious co-existence between humans and non-human organisms and the environment. It also needs to rest on behaviour that is based on love, understanding, trust as well as fairness as these qualities are those that can help to make the world a better place for all to live in. When all these qualities are present, we will be able to listen and empathise with others and lend a hand to make things better. It is these commitments that my study rests upon.
Finally, in my narratives and descriptions of events in this thesis, I refer to myself as ‘I’, ‘my’ and ‘myself’. When narratives relate to actions which involve collaboration between myself and the practitioners, I use the term ‘team’. Finally, when narratives relate to myself, children and practitioners, I use the term ‘participants.’
2.8 Summary
In this chapter, I have provided the contextual information for this study and focused on some key aspects of sustainable development such as the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs); the Earth Charter and Little Earth Charter, whilst showing their relevance to the study. I also provided information on key global conferences and initiatives on sustainable development that have paved the way for the global awareness and growth of sustainable development initiatives.
I also provided contextual information on early childhood education and care provisions in England to justify the need for this study as the country’s early childhood curriculum, the Early Years Foundation Stage, is ‘silent’ on sustainability. The contextual information has shown how an important concept like sustainability is significant for everyone, especially the need for it to start from the early years.
31 In the next chapter (Three), I will present a review of existing literature from across the globe which form the basis of this study. The review explores studies on education for sustainable development and environmental education.
33 Chapter Three: Literature review
In this chapter, I critically explore literature on the topic of education for sustainable development (ESD) in the early years focusing especially on discussion papers and studies carried out by notable authors in the research field: Julie Davis, Ingrid Pramling-Samuelsson, Eva Ärlemalm-Hagsér, Susan Edwards and John Siraj- Blatchford, amongst others. Much of the reviewed literature covers studies carried out in Australia, New Zealand and Nordic countries like Norway and Sweden, that are noted for their significant research on early childhood education for sustainable development and environmental education. Other works refer to England and other countries like Iceland, Turkey, China and Cameroon in Africa.
As I stated at the outset (see Chapter One), my literature search was informed by the reviews of literature in the field of early childhood education for sustainability. I focused mainly on educational databases such as ERIC, the Education database (ProQuest), Education Research Complete (EBSCO), JSTOR and Gale Cengage, amongst others, to research peer reviewed journals and articles that focus on research in the field of early childhood education for sustainability. In my search, I used keywords such as ‘early childhood’, ‘education for sustainable development’, ‘education for sustainability’ and ‘environmental education’. This search led me to journals such as Early Education; Early Child Development and Care; International Journal of Early Years Education; International Journal of Early Childhood; Environmental Research; Environmental Education Research; and Australian Journal of Environmental Education; where I was able to scan abstracts of articles that focus on early childhood education and care for sustainability and nature/outdoor play and young children. My review of these articles showed that most of them reported on studies that were conducted with young children in preschools (or kindergartens) and in schools, whilst some of them focused on studies that were conducted with early years practitioners or pre-school service teachers and addressed environmental or sustainability education. Based on this development, I have identified 31 studies that have influenced my decision-making in this project, and they are summarised in the table in Appendix 2.
Reviewing these earlier studies enabled me to gain insights and understandings into the topic of ESD and appropriate methodological approaches. In addition, they
34 highlighted some vital theoretical perspectives from which they were carried out, providing insights to support the theoretical framework that I have adopted for my study.
This review of literature also enabled me to identify some current challenges and issues in early childhood education for sustainability policy, practice and research raising questions that need to be answered, thereby paving the way for this study as well as the research process. The review also led me to identify eleven (11) key themes which highlight approaches that address sustainability issues and which practitioners need to consider when planning and implementing practical activities with children that support ESD. I have presented the literature review under these eleven key themes which I found to be repeatedly present in the studies. The discussions of each theme vary considerably in length, but this is not a reflection of value that I place on each of them, and where appropriate, these themes are considered at the later analytical stages. I start with themes about play as this is really significant for both this thesis and for early childhood education. Play is widely recognised and validated as a key characteristic of effective practice in early childhood education (Wood, 2010). It is viewed as a compelling activity that promotes children’s cognitive, physical, social and emotional well-being, especially in the development of their communication and collaborative skills (Siraj-Blatchford, 2009; Bento & Dias, 2017). It provides opportunities for children to explore and construct new knowledge as they experiment, solve problems, think creatively and cooperate with others (Bento & Dias, 2017; Lino & Parente, 2018). Based on these claims, I hold play to be the best way to present a concept as daunting as sustainable development to children as young as those in this study.