Place, Home, and Story in Environmental Education

Abstract

The personal experience of place is a fundamental step toward understanding our environment. Environmental education should foster an exploration of the place within which we each live. A sense of place, though, is not sufficient. We must cherish our place in our environment as home, and we should act to protect and improve it as we would our home—for indeed it is. Stories provide a psychologically powerful tool for understanding our environment and our relationships with it. Environmental educators should make good use of place, home, and story in their teaching.