“We never even touched plants this way”: school gardens as an embodied context for motivating environmental actions

Abstract

A critical objective of environmental education (EE) is sustained and active care for the natural world. Numerous studies point to the inadequacy of information-centered pedagogies in motivating such ecologically responsive action. The primacy of action in effectively addressing environmental issues calls for conceptions of EE that emphasize the conative and affective domains of the human mind. While recent research studies have recognized the significance of affective approaches in EE, the role of sensory and embodied engagements, which ground such affective encounters, are relatively less understood. Based on a year-long facilitation of a school terrace-garden in a metropolitan city, we outline how situated and embodied interactions can foster an understanding of diverse ecological practices, and thus a different way of being with the natural world. The study indicates that multi-modal sensorimotor experiences, and the possibility of sharing these with others, motivate children to expand their sphere of environmental activities beyond the site of learning. Specifically, students extended their care-based interactions with the garden to their communities and broader ecological issues. These findings indicate that integrative forms of situated and embodied interactions with the living world can provide the generative force to learn, act, care, and live in ways that encourage ecological flourishing.

Keywords:

• School gardens
• affect
• embodied cognition
• joint-action

SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS:

• SDG 11: Sustainable cities and communities

Acknowledgments

We are grateful to Dibyanshee Mishra, Adithi Muralidhar and members of the Learning Sciences Research Group, HBCSE for their help with video recording and data transcription. The consistent support of Nandita Khanna, the principal of Nalanda Public School, and teachers Samira Mukherjee, Jaya Pillai, and Madhuri Bapat is gratefully acknowledged. We also thank members of the Green Souls organization in guiding the creation of the school food garden.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This research was made possible through the support of the Govt. of India, Department of Atomic Energy, under Project Identification No. RTI4001.