Summer Institute 2012University of Manitoba

EDUCATION FOR SUSTAINABILITY

Today’s Topic: What do you value?

Invocation - Gary

Contemplative practice: Meditation

Readings: Group discussion The Two Davids• David Orr’s “What is education for? Six myths about the foundations of modern education, and six new principles to replace them”.• David Chapman’s “Sustainability and our cultural myths”.• Values education –Is this a component of your teaching? How easy is it for you?

Readings: Group discussion • Share your Informal Response to

the Readings with each other. • Use one or more of your

discussion questions to deepen your thinking.

• Be prepared to share the flavor of your group’s discussion with the rest of the class.

Readings: Snowballing•Begin this activity by considering the idea, raised in Chapman’s article, that schools reproduce existing social relations and injustice. Namely, “the concept of sustainability has become part of the reproductive mechanisms and needs to be challenged…” (p. 94) Moreover, the concept of sustainability “has to be reconstructed as a critical point of leverage for change” (p. 99). And finally, “…most environmental education is against the environment because it does not confront the issues of cause and therefore tacitly supports the status quo” (p. 100).

Break• Barbara’s Menu

Walk Score• What’s you neighbourhood’s ranking?• What’s not being measured

Carbon Footprint• Lowest to Highest Carbon Footprints

• Distribution of wealth globally

The richest 2% of adults in the world own more than 50% of global household wealth

The richest 10% of adults accounted for 85% the world’s total global assets

The bottom half of the world adult population owned barely 1% of global wealth

925 million people live on less than $1.25 a day

The estimated number of childhood deaths in 2010 was 7.6 million

Regional Wealth Shares

Number of Hungry People in the World

What are you willing to do without• “Live simply so that others can simply live”• A “Needs vs. Wants” activity you might use with your students

ActivityWhat do you value most in the following domains of your life:

• Personal and Family• Professional (ex. What are valuable forms of pedagogy?)• Community

Lunch

Activity - Daily InventoryRecord the timeline of a typical day in the following domains of your life:

• Personal and Family• Professional• Community

Activity•With a partner, describe any disconnects you observe. Why do you think they exist? •What action could be taken to close the gap between values and day-to-day life?

Tai Chi with Thomas Falkenberg

Activity – Four Corners• Should Canadians have the legal right to assisted suicide?http://www.cbc.ca/news/yourcommunity/2012/06/should-canadians-have-the-legal-right-to-assisted-suicide-1.html• Should the government’s Experimental lakes Area be shut down?• http://www.cbc.ca/news/yourcommunity/2012/06/should-the-govern

ments-experimental-lakes-area-be-shut-down.html • Is the War of 1812 tribute’s $28 M money well spent? http://www.cbc.ca/news/yourcommunity/2012/06/is-the-war-of-1812-tributes-28m-money-well-spent.html• Should the government always seek clemency for Canadians

sentenced to death abroad?

http://www.cbc.ca/news/yourcommunity/2012/04/should-government-seek-clemency-for-canadians-on-death-row.html

Your ideas 

Readings: Send a Problem• Each group writes a question or problem on a flashcard connected to the Orr and Chapman readings. The group reaches consensus on possible answer(s) or solution(s) and writes it on the back. Each group then passes its cards to another group, which formulates its own answers or solutions and checks them against those written on the back by the sending group. If groups disagree, the receiving group writes its answer as an alternative. Written problems continue to rotate from group to group until they are returned to the original senders, who then examine and discuss any alternative answers or solutions given by other groups.

Homework for July 6th • Readings (see readings schedule)• Informal response (IR) – What are the implications of the ideas presented in the readings for your professional and personal life?• Come with a group discussion question (include at the bottom of IR)• Daily Reflective Journal (DRJ)• Hand-in group topic

Group Work