CASE FOREST – Case Forest – pedagogic towards sustainable development

04.09.2008

Accepted for funding from the Lifelong Learning Programme (Comenius) 29.8.2008

In this project the goal is to create a method, which will facilitate the teaching and improve the learning about forests and how it influences the every-day life for all of us. The target group is teachers in compulsory schools and the method should fit for children from the age of 12.

The project will be based on a problem-based methodology, which is developed by METKA research group at Savonlinna department of teacher education, University of Joensuu in Finland. In this methodology the children use a computer based planning tool. With this tool the pupils can plan in advance an excursion to forests, forest industry, forest museum or some other place. The pupils have to choose a research problem or a question they are interested in and decide how they will solve it. Then they do their research, interviews, study visits or another activity. In the final analysis they share the results of their study; how have they been able to open the concept sustainability and what did they discover?   

In the project the methodology will be tested in all eight countries and adjusted it for national conditions.

It is believed that this methodology will increase the value of forest pedagogy and it will be used by all organisations in the consortium. It will also be of interest for teachers who like to improve the education about sustainability especially when it comes to forests.

Besides the methodology, the project will result in a web page, which will include teacher-manuals, fact-sheets about sustainable development with emphasis on forests and contacts and links to other useful pages in different countries. Except for the teacher manuals, which will be in eight languages, the web page will be in English.

The consortium consists of 12 partners from 8 different countries; Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, the Czech republic, Slovakia and Bulgaria. Both the education sector and forest sector will be represented in the project.

The duration of the project will be 18 months