Action Research and Community Problem‐solving: environmental education in an inner‐city

Abstract

ABSTRACT In this contribution I discuss Action Research & Community Problem Solving (AR&CPS) as an approach to environmental education. From the perspective of an outside facilitator I will Illustrate the learning process with the case of Pistons Middle School which is located in the city of Detroit, USA. Environmental education here is defined as the process that enables students and teachers to participate more fully in the planning, implementing and evaluating of educational activities aimed at resolving an environmental issue that the learners have identified. What an ‘environmental issue” is then depends on the perceptions and the experiences of the learner as well as on the context in which education takes place. Given that the educational activities are aimed at resolving an environmental issue, students and teachers actively seek to improve the (local) biophysical and/or social environment while engaged in an interdisciplinary learning process (DiChiro & Stapp, 1986).