Hostname: page-component-7bb8b95d7b-dvmhs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-09-20T21:37:50.958Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Mrs Blue Gum, Some Puppets and a Remnant Forest: Towards Sustainability Education through Drama Pedagogy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 June 2015

Ellen Appleby
Ellen Appleby*
Affiliation:
Central Queensland University
*
†Central Queensland University, Noosa Hub, PO Box 336, Pomona, Queensland 4568, Australia. Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This paper focuses on a case study of the collaborative development of an environmental education unit involving the use of puppetry and drama. The collaboration was between an experienced classroom teacher beginning to use drama, and a drama/environmental educator and researcher. The critical lens for the analysis was sustainability education, including how this aligns with some recent theory on multiplist and evaluativist meaning-making. It is argued that these modes of meaning-making are necessary pedagogical goals of an eco-connected pedagogy. This case study showed that collaborative planning, implementation and reflection of drama pedagogy was not only a catalyst for more complex and deeper levels of meaning-making for the classroom teacher, but also prompted discussion about other important issues such as the quality of student engagement, classroom power dynamics and authentic assessment. In addition the teacher observed a range of outcomes achieved by her students that align with sustainability education as they became immersed in a dramatic world. In particular she observed that the students, through role-playing and writing about points of view not necessarily their own, developed deeper understandings demonstrating multiplist and evaluativist meaning creation.

Keywords

puppetrydrama pedagogysustainability educationpersonal epistemologyhigher order thinking
Type
Research Article
Information
Australian Journal of Environmental Education , Volume 21 , 2005 , pp. 1 - 10
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2005

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Appleby, E. (2002). Pretending to literacy - learning literacy through drama: evaluation report. Brisbane: Centre for Applied Theatre Research, Griffith University.Google Scholar
Bowers, C. A., & Flinders, D. J. (1990). Responsive teaching: an ecological approach to classroom patterns of language, culture and thought. New York: Teachers College Press.Google Scholar
Bowers, C. A. (1993). Education, cultural myths and the ecological crisis. New York: State University of New York Press.Google Scholar
Bundy, P. (2003). Aesthetic engagement in the drama process. Research in Drama Education, 8(2), 171–181.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Edmiston, B. (2000). Drama as ethical education. Research in Drama Education, 5(2), 63–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ely, M., Vinz, R., Downing, M., & Anzul, M. (1997). On writing qualitative research: living by words. London & Philadelphia: Routledge/Falmer.Google Scholar
Feldman, A. (1999). The role of conversation in collaborative action research. Educational Action Research, 7(1), 125–144.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fien, J. (1993). Education for the environment: critical theorizing and environmental education. Geelong: Deakin University Press.Google Scholar
Fien, J. (2001). Education for sustainability: reorientating Australian schools for a sustainable future. Fitzroy, Vic: Australian Conservation Foundation Inc.Google Scholar
Hofer, B. K. (2003). Personal epistemology as a psychological and educational construct: an introduction. In Hofer, B. K. & Pintrich, P. R. (Eds.), Personal epistemology: the psychology of beliefs about knowledge and knowing (pp. 1–14). New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
Huckle, J. (1996). Teacher education. In Huckle, J. & Sterling, S. (Eds.), Education for sustainability (pp. 104–119). London: Earthscan Publications.Google Scholar
Hutchinson, D. (1998). Growing up green: education for ecological renewal. New York: Teachers College Press.Google Scholar
Kuhn, D., & Weinstock, M. (2003). What is epistemological thinking and why does it matter? In Hofer, B. K. & Pintrich, P. R. (Eds.), Personal epistemology: the psychology of beliefs about knowledge and knowing (pp. 121–145). New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
Lather, P. (1986). Research as praxis. Harvard Educational Review, 56(3), 257–277.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marzano, R. J., Gaddy, B. B., & Dean, C. (2000). What works in classroom instruction. Aurora, CO.: McRel.Google Scholar
O'Sullivan, E. (1999). Transformative learning: educational vision for the 21st Century. London & New York: Zed Books.Google Scholar
O'Toole, J. (1992). The process of drama: negotiating art and meaning. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Polanyi, M. (1966/1983). The tacit dimension. Gloucester, Mass.: Peter Smith.Google Scholar
Sterling, S. (2001). Sustainable education: re-visioning learning and change. Totnes, Devon, UK: Green Books Ltd.Google Scholar
Wagner, B. J. (1998). Educational drama and language arts: what research shows. Portsmouth, NH.: Heinemann.Google Scholar