Environmental literacy of students is one of the traditional research areas in the field of environmental and sustainability education. The concept of environmental literacy usually encapsulates environmental awareness, sensitivity, in-depth understanding of possible solutions to environmental problems, environmentally-relevant values, motivation, skills and competence to protect the environment, and willingness to act (Roth, 1992; Hollweg et al., 2011).

Environmental literacy of students or teachers has been repeatedly analyzed in many countries, like Germany (Roczen et al, 2014), Taiwan (Hsu & Roth, 1998; Shiang-Yao et al. (2015), Israel (Yavetz, Goldman, & Pe’er, 2009; Negev et al., 2008), China (Chneg & So, 2014), South Africa (Swanepoel et al., 2002), Turkey (Tuncer et al., 2007; Erdogan & Ok, 2011), Macedonia (Srbinkovski, Erdogan & Ismaili, 2010) or other countries.

Among others, the reasons for environmental literacy research are two-fold:. From the national perspective, the studies provide information for the ESE decision-makers to provide relevant data for ESE-related politics. Furthermore, the environmental literacy research usually focuses on the respondents‘ environmental knowledge, attitudes, and behavior, and their mutual relationship.

Moreover, the concept of environmental literacy has been repeatedly used for assessing the impact of various ESE programs. Goldman et al. (2008) applied it for analyzing the influence of the Green School project in Israel, Krnel and Naglic (2009) for assessing the Eco-School program in Slovenia, Spinola (2015) for evaluating the same program in Portugal, Erdogan (2015) for assessing the impact of summer educational program on elementary school students, Culen and Mony (2003) for evaluating a non-formal education program.

Recently, similar approaches, like the concept of sustainability consciousness, emerged, and have been used for assessing the effectiveness of selected ESE-teaching strategies. Particularly, the authors focused on the pluralistic and holistic approach applied in Swedish secondary schools. Their studies brought important insights into the development of students’ sustainability consciousness, the level of application of ESE strategies in schools, and their impact on students (dePauw, Gericke, Olsson, D., & Berglund & 2015; Olsson, Gericke, & Chang Rundgren, 2015).

In the Czech Republic, no national survey of environmental literacy was conducted before this study. However, a set of papers focused on testing various instruments for environmental literacy on smaller samples have been published in the last ten years (Kroufek & Svobodova, 2018, 2016; Kroufek, Chytry, Janovec, Smidkova, 2016; Kroufek, 2016; Kroufek, Celik & Cen, 2015; Cincera, 2007). 

Based on this effort, the Czech national environmental literacy framework was designed and tested in 2019-2021. The framework was aimed to assess the environmental literacy of secondary school students on both national and regional levels. Besides, the instrument allowed assessing selected ESE-relevant teaching strategies (e.g., holistic approach, participative approach, community-based approach) and their relationship to environmental literacy of secondary school students.

This paper focuses on the following research questions: a) what is the relationship of selected components of environmental literacy and, particularly, their responsible environmental behavior, b) what is the impact of selected ESE-teaching strategies on the environmental literacy of students, and c) what is the level of environmental literacy of the Czech secondary school students.

To obtain relevant data, a stratified sample of 641 Czech schools was selected. In each of the schools, one class of 8th-grade students (Mage=13.4 years) was involved. In total, data from the representative sample of N=21518 students were collected. Students were asked to provide their answers in questionnaires and multiple-choice tests. The questionnaires investigated students’ place attachment (7 items, Cronbach alpha=0,81), climate change attitudes (Cronbach alpha=0,79), locus of control (Cronbach alpha=0,68) (Powell et al., 2011), and environmental behavior (Cronbach alpha=0,79). Students’ environmental values were assessed by the 2-MEV instrument, in the three-factor version by Bogner (2018), with Preservation scale (9 items, Cronbach alpha=0,71), Utilization scale (7 items, Cronbach alpha=0,70), and Appreciation of Nature scale (5 items, Cronbach alpha=0,81). Besides, students completed a multiple-choice test of Environmental knowledge (Cronbach alpha=0,67). The validity of the test was obtained by a group of external experts. All of the instruments were initially piloted in smaller groups of secondary school students. In the last part, the questionnaire focused on students’ perceived ESE-strategies (Olsson, Gericke, and Chang Rundgren, 2015). Students were asked to indicate if they perceived their ESE as participative and pluralistic (7 items, Cronbach alpha=0,74), holistic (3 items, Cronbach alpha=0,74), and connected with their community (3 items, Cronbach alpha=0,61). They also indicated if they participated in a residential outdoor environmental education program in the last two years and if they are members of an environmentally-focused team or club in their school. To analyze the obtained data, factor analyses (41,04% of total variance explained), regression analyses, and t-test for comparing students according to gender, participation in the residential program, and membership in an eco-club were used.

The findings supported a crucial role of locus of control and environmental attitudes (preservation of nature and appreciation of nature) on pro-environmental behavior, while the role of other variables remained limit, or moderated by respondents‘ locus of control. Students’ climate change attitudes were correlated with their environmental knowledge and attitudes but had no significant relationship with pro-environmental behavior. The respondents who participated in a residential environmental education program, or who were members of a school environmentally-focused clubs, had a higher level of pro-environmental behavior, attitudes, and the most of other investigated variables. Perceived participative and community-based approach in ESE was correlated with students’ locus of control, the perceived holistic approach with their climate change attitudes. Gender influenced most of the investigated variables, with girls reporting a higher level of environmental values and behavior than boys. The study contributed to the field by a) developing an instrument for assessing secondary school students' environmental literacy and its evaluation in the middle-European context, b) analyzing the relationships among the components of environmental literacy, c) evaluating the merit of selected ESE-relevant instructional strategies. It formed the basis for future surveys on both regional and national levels to analyze the trends in environmental literacy and the effectiveness of ESE policy.

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