The Revisioning of Environmental Education: a critical analysis of recent policy shifts in England and Wales

ABSTRACT

Environmental education within both the formal and informal education sectors across England and Wales has been developed over the last 25 years, although some of its provision remains problematical and its effectiveness remains largely unproven. The formal schools sector has seen attempts to stimulate and steer practice in schools, both by means of free‐standing activities whose purpose was to help develop the field, partly in the light of European and wider international activity, and also through activities tied to specific national educational initiatives, for example, the development of the National Curriculum. This paper looks at recent policy shifts and argues, firstly, that such policy changes amount to an attempt to revision environmental education in schools and, secondly, that the policy is both under‐theorised and lacks important elements of support, which will render it largely ineffective.