Brief description: Schools are platforms for learning about our environment and its protection. Despite being faced with the same learning opportunities, however, learning outcomes are very heterogeneous. In this study, 261 students participated in a 180 minutes educational program about the forest ecosystem and related sustainability topics. The learning module was based on 8-station and relied on a student-centered learning approach, i.e., collaborative, hands-on, and autonomy-supportive. Environmental knowledge was measured at three times, that is prior to the program (pre-test), right after program completion (post-test), and six weeks after program completion to test long-term learning (retention-test). Knowledge scores increased right after program completion and decreased in the retention-test, though retention-scores remained considerably above pre-test scores. We were also interested in environmental attitude’s role in learning. Attitude considerably affected knowledge scores of each test time, while the effects on pre- and retention-scores were larger. Surprisingly, retention-scores of those students with highest attitude scores exceeded their post-program attitude scores.

More details:

Research questions:

• To what extend do students gain and retain environmental knowledge about the forest ecosystem and related sustainabiltiy topics over the course of a student-centered educational programme?
• How does environmental attitude relate to knowledge scores prior to, right after, and six weeks after the educational programme? To what extend does environmental attitude help students gain and retain their environmental knowledge?

Pedagogical framework: The study is based on a 8-station module that relies on a collaborative, hands-on, and autonomy-supportive learning approach. Since it is not only important to highlight environmental attitude's role in learning, we briefly describe the learning module and those elements that (most likely) promote environmental attitude in a classroom setting. There is thus a focus on pedagogical approaches: collaborative learning, Deci and Ryan's (2012) self-determination theory, and a hands-on learning. Those are the title's and is thus the content of the 8 work stations:

1. The forest and its trees
2. The age of trees
3. Forest litter
4. Forest pollution
5. Deadwood and its inhabitants
6. Hunters of the night – bats
7. Are trees made of air?
8. Ecological footprint

Methodological/ statistical framework: To calibrate environmental knowledge and attitude, we  rely on the Campbell Paradigm (Kaiser et al., 2010). The paradigm says that a person's attitude and the cost invovled in a behavior affect the likelihood that a behavior will be carried out (i.e., pro-environmental behavior). In this line, the calibration provides two critical outputs: It gives an estimation of each item's difficulty (i.e., how demanding it is to agree with a statement or engage in a certain behavior) and an estimation of a person's attitude (derived from the type and amount of agreement and engagement in the items given). The calibration thus allows to point at critical statements/ behaviors that can be lowered through external prompts/ incentives/ etc. or through strengthening environmental attitudes.

Environmental attitude (selected from the item-pool of Baierl, Kaiser, & Bogner, 2022) is a compilation of student’s self-reports of their past engagement in nature preservation activities and from their expressions of support for protecting the environment. For the 9 behavior-based items, students indicated how frequently they have engaged in pro-environmental activities (never, rarely, sometimes, often, or always). For the 16 opinion-based items, students indicated their degree of agreement (strongly disagree, disagree, not sure/ neutral, agree, or strongly agree). For reliability, 8 items were negatively formulated and reverse coded prior to the analysis. Environmental attitude was calibrated as a unidimensional Rasch scale. The separation reliability (rel. = .73) estimates the accuracy in distinguishing between the students. Student parameters (logits) ranged from –2.86 to 2.18, and the higher a score, the stronger a person’s pro-environmental attitude is. Item-fit values reflect the discrepancy between the model’s prediction and the actual data with mean square values (MS: .80 ≤ MS ≤ 1.20) weighted by the item variance (.80-1.31; Bond & Fox, 2013; Wright & Masters, 1982). Environmental knowledge consists of system, action, and effectiveness knowledge (the three dimensions are derived from Roczen et al., 2014) and is used to reflect cognitive learning. System knowledge covers facts and an understanding of our natural environment. Action knowledge builds on system knowledge and asks about an individual’s nature-preservation behaviors. Effectiveness knowledge is on a broader scale and covers the ecological impact of actions. The questionnaire comprised 36 items (12 system, 12 action, and 12 effectiveness items). Students filled in the questionnaire three times (prior to, right after, and six weeks after the program). Environmental knowledge was also calibrated as a unidimensional Rasch scale (see Adams & Khoo, 2015). In a multiple choice format, students marked one of four options. The Rasch output shows in logits and represent the level of each person’s knowledge. The higher the value, the more correct answers a student had, so the stronger we expect his or her environmental knowledge to be. Logits ranged from –1.93 to 2.51. Item difficulties indicate how demanding each item was and ranged from –2.05 to 2.53, so the items were able to differentiate well between the students, which showed in a fairly robust reliability score (rel. = .71; MS: .84-1.18)

Learning about the environment and related sustainability topics appears to strongly relate to environmental attitude: Although students were faced with the same learning opportunities, those with stronger attitudes knew more before program participation, right after program completion, and in the long-term learning test. Students with weaker attitudes only achieved comparatively strong knowledge-scores right after program completion which points to external rather than internal motivators for knowledge acquisition. Those with strongest environmental attitudes, on the other hand, must have engaged in the topic before and after the educational program since their retention-scores outlevelled their post-program scores. Thus, those students with strongest attitudes not only sustained long-term knowledge over time but gained more knowledge probably from outside the classroom setting. This points to environmental attitudes important role for learning about the environment to guide students toward living a more sustainable lifestyle.

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