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Ingrid Pramling Samuelsson and John Siraj-Blatchford

“ESD promotes efforts to rethink educational programmes and systems (both methods and contents) that currently support unsustainable societies.” UNESCO (2014a) “…learning begins at birth” (Jomtien Declaration)

Abstract Following the inauguration of the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development

(DESD) (2005-2014), this paper provides a review of the progress that has been made, and the

lessons that have been learnt in our development of an Education for Sustainable Development

(ESD) in Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE). The importance of life-long learning to the

development of sustainable societies is widely recognized, and ECCE relates to the first and most

influential stage of the learning life course (Engel et al., 2007). All children have the right, as well as a

responsibility, to be educated for sustainable development, and overwhelming research evidence

shows that it is in the early years that children have the greatest capacity to learn. It is also in early

childhood that the foundations of many of our fundamental attitudes and values are first put into

place.

In response to the crisis of unsustainability, most educators and politicians might imagine that in the

following pages we would therefore be exclusively concerned to identify the progress that has been

made in the development of pre-primary classroom curriculum content and pedagogy. Yet we have

found that most authorities and experts in ECCE, as in many in other areas of education, are even

more anxious to consider the progress that is being made, and the learning taking place; “….amongst

policymakers, amongst senior management, amongst teachers, lecturers, support staff, amongst

parents, amongst employers, etc., so that education itself can be more transformative and

appropriate to our times” (Sterling, 2008).

It is now widely recognized that Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) begins at birth, and the

provisions within ECCE are mostly informal, and/or non-formally educational in nature. The most

significant educational transformation that is required to achieve an ECCE for ESD must therefore be

to integrate care and education along with health, safety and play provisions, from birth onwards in

and through pre-primary school settings, but also in the home, and in the wider community.

Growing up in poverty has a profound and lasting impact on the learning and development of young

children. Child safety, nutrition and hygiene in early childhood are also of critical importance in

determining their educational outcomes. Attachment, cognitive and physical stimulation, and

communicative interaction in early childhood have a massive impact on every child’s future learning

and development. Most of the readers of this report will have benefitted significantly from the

investments made by their parents and primary carers in these terms. But tragically, through an

accident of birth, crisis, or natural disaster, many children fail to benefit in this way, even if the

influence of some high quality ECCE programs have been shown to provide compensation (NICHD

2002, Sylva et al, 2004, 2010, Schweinhart et al, 2004, 2005). An ECCE-ESD curriculum model, which

ignored these brutal realities, would be addressing the educational needs of only the most privileged

children in the world.

In reviewing the progress being made in developing an education for sustainable development in

early childhood we have found that:

1. Environmental education has a long history and at the start of the decade this was already well

developed in pre-primary educational practice in many countries. Yet ESD awareness at the start of

the decade was extremely limited, and even after nearly 10 years ESD educational provision remains

fragmented within and between countries around the world. However there are signs that it ESD is

building momentum in ECCE, and we expect the institution of the new UN Sustainable Development

Goals will accelerate this process.

2. Most significantly in the past decade, there has been a growing awareness of the importance of

early childhood education to the realisation of sustainable development more generally. Research

and development has also grown in early childhood ESD and OMEP in particular has taken a lead in

promoting ESD around the world.

3. UNESCO has provided significant support, through the publication of research and discussion

papers, and in particular through the Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (DESD )

exemplars of good ESD practice (UNESCO, 2012a). The establishment of an Early Years Chair in ESD

by UNESCO has also been extremely influential but a great deal more needs to be done to

mainstream ESD practice, and for governments around the world to adopt more holistic ‘joined up

thinking’ with regard to ECCE and ESD. As the second DESD survey of Member States, Key

Stakeholders and UN Agencies carried out by UNESCO (2014a) found more generally (p,15), the

DESD has been influential in helping to raise awareness of ESD in ECCE, even if the DESD still has a

long way to go in stimulating changes in ECCE practice or on sustainability itself. In ECCE the DESD

has undoubtedly contributed towards ESD establishing itself as en ‘emerging interest’, and in a

minority of countries (in Australasia and Scandinavia in particular) it might even be considered to

have contributed to ‘solid work in progress’ (op cit, p16)

In the second DESD survey UNESCO (2014a) only 26% of the Member states considered ‘significant

progress’ was being made in implementing ESD in pre-primary education (compared with 46/7% in

primary and secondary. It is also important to note that all of the questions included in the survey

emphasised curriculum changes that will only have been considered to apply to the pre-primary

component of ECCE (i.e. only one category of ISCED level 0).

The survey rating scale suggests that, while ESD has not yet been fully integrated into any education

sectors, it has advanced from 2005, and progress is being made. However, it is notable that from the

data provided, the very least progress is reported to have been made so far in pre-primary (p22). We

argue in this paper that progress being made across the whole of ECCE (ISCED level 0) is significantly

weaker and that progress must be monitored more closely and holistically. As one respondent to the

UNESCO (2014a) survey noted:

“As we deal with ESD programs, we found the importance of early childhood education requires

more attention than we had expected. Many believed that it is crucial to draw attention of young

children to sustainable lifestyle which will lead to life-long habit.” (Republic of Korea, KS) (UNESCO,

2014a, p30)

1. Introduction Since the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) convened in Johannesburg in 2002 it

has been widely recognised that education has a major role to play in the realisation of a ‘vision of

sustainability that links economic well-being with respect for cultural diversity, the Earth and its

resources’ (UNESCO, 2007a). There is also general agreement that education for sustainable

development (ESD) has to be an integral part of quality Education for All (EFA) as defined in the

Dakar Framework for Action (WEF, 2000), and it must begin in the early childhood years and

continue through lifelong learning in adulthood (UNECE, 2005, Feine, 2012, Wals, 2009)

Resolution 57/254 of the United Nations General Assembly declared the period 2005-2014 as the

Decade for Education for Sustainable Development (DESD) with an overall goal to:

“…integrate values, activities and principles that are inherently linked to sustainable development

into all forms of education and learning and help usher in a change in attitudes, behaviours and

values to ensure a more sustainable future in social environmental and economic terms” (UNESCO,

2007b)

The UNESCO objectives of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) are to:

Facilitate networking, linkages, exchange and interaction among stakeholders in ESD

Foster an increased quality of teaching and learning in education for sustainable

development

Help countries make progress towards and attain the Millennium Development Goals

through ESD efforts

Provide countries with new opportunities to incorporate ESD into education reform efforts

(UNESCO, 2007b)

As Feine (2012) has argued, ESD must begin in the early childhood years, and requires

“transformative learning”…”within the common and global constraints of climate change, dwindling

ecosystem services and environmental degradation”. In fact, today’s children bear a

disproportionate share of the impact of climate change, both in the immediate and longer-term

(Oxfam, 2009, Stone and Loft, 2009, IDS, 2010):

“From long standing hazards to emerging ones, environmental factors are estimated to contribute

up to 25% of death and disease globally reaching nearly 35% in some African regions. Children are

most vulnerable to the impact of harmful conditions and account for 66% of the victims of

environment-induced illnesses." (UNEP, 2014)

During emergency and high stress situations the risk of abuse and violence towards children is also

increased (UNHCR, 2008). According to a study by Alderman et al (2006) children exposed to drought

and civil strife in Zimbabwe during their early years suffered an average height loss of 3.4

centimetres, they lost a year of schooling and significant reductions in lifetime earnings. These are all

significant concerns for ESD in ECCE. It has been estimated that 200 million children under age 5 in

low- and middle-income countries fail to reach their developmental potential (Grantham-McGregor

et al, 2007, Sherr et al, 2009, Walker et al, 2011). Most importantly, the extant research

demonstrates that the risk factors and adverse experiences of these young children can be

counteracted using evidence-based early interventions (Engel et al, 2007, 2011). In fact the extant

research evidence from Neuroscience, psychology, and from economic studies of human capital

development, the value of public investments in ECCE is strongly emphasised, particularly for

children from economically disadvantaged families (Barnett, et al, 2007 Heckman 2006, Heckman

and Knudsen, 2006, Rolnick and Grunewald, 2006, and Feinstein 2003, 2004).

2. Background ’Sustainable Development’ was first defined in 1987 by the Bruntland World Commission on

Environment and Development (WCED), which argued for a development strategy that:

“…meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet

their own needs” (WCED, 1987, p.43).

From a citizenship perspective it is therefore clear that the citizen group with the greatest stake in

achieving sustainability are children. In fact the younger the child, the greater their stake in the

future is. As Little and Green (2009) point out, more recent and complete definitions drawn from

the 1987 Commission report contain two additional key concepts:

The concept of ‘need’, in particular the essential needs of the world’s poor, to which overriding

priority should be given, and;

The idea of limitations imposed by the state of technology and social organisation on the

environment’s ability to meet present and future needs (WCED 1987, p 43).

Agenda 21 which was adopted by most of the, world’s governments at the Rio de Janeiro ‘Earth

Summit’ (UNCED, 1992) also introduced the notion of ‘sustainable consumption’ and the idea that

people in rich countries needed to change their consumption patterns if sustainable development

was to be achieved.

The work of Amartyn Sen has also been influential. Sen argued that while the WCED (1987) ‘need’

centred view of development was “illuminating,” it was “incomplete” (Sen, 2013, p. 2). He argued

that individuals should be seen as “agents who can think and act” and not like “patients” whose

needs had to be catered for (ibid, p. 2). If we are to support the public to “think, assess, evaluate,

resolve, inspire, agitate, and through these means, reshape the world” (ibid, p. 1), then we must

begin by recognising that the public are at all times actively engaged in the continous production and

reproduction of their social and cultural practices. Yet the freedom and capability of different

individuals and groups have in these processes are often be limited by political and institutional

structures, and aspirations and expectations are often unduly limited.

Sen therefore redefined sustainable development as “development that promotes the capabilities of

present people without compromising capabilities of future generations” (Sen 2013, p. 5). Sen’s

‘capability’ centered approach to sustainable development aims to “integrate the idea of

sustainability with the perspective of freedom, so that we see human beings not merely as creatures

who have needs but primarily as people whose freedoms really matter” (ibid, p.6).

This more educational perspective resonates strongly with the position taken by Schumacher (1999)

where he argued:

“Development does not start with goods; it starts with people and their education, organization,

and discipline. Without these three, all resources remain latent, untapped, potential” (ibid, p. 139).

The goals of the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development 2005-2014 have

therefore been to integrate the principles, values, and practices of sustainable development into all

aspects of education and learning. Education for sustainable development provides a vision of

education that seeks to balance human and economic well-being with cultural traditions and respect

for the environment. As Feine (2012) suggests: ”…to be truly sustainable, development processes

have to take account of, and balance, the mutually interacting and dependent social, economic,

environmental and cultural pillars of sustainable development.”. The United Nations 2005 World

Summit Outcome Document referred to the "interdependent and mutually reinforcing pillars" of

sustainable development as social development, economic development, and environmental

protection (Fig. 1). The challenge for early childhood educators has therefore been to develop

educational systems, curriculum and pedagogic practices that are sustainable in terms of each of

these pillars.

In terms of the pre-primary curriculum, environmental education has a long history and may be

considered fundamental to the established principles of early childhood education identified in the

educational writings of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (McCrea, 2006), Robert Owen (Siraj-Blatchford,

1996), and John Dewey (McCrea, 2006). For example, in 1826 Friedrich Frobel, wrote:

“The pupil will get the clearest insight into the character of things, of nature and surroundings, if he

sees and studies them in their natural connection..” (Froebel, 1826)

At the start of the UNESCO decade for Education for Sustainable development, environmental

education was therefore well developed in many countries. In many countries, some significant

Social and Cultural concerns of ESD were also being addressed in early childhood curriculum

initiatives concerned with social justice and bias (Derman-Sparkes and Edwards, 2010), multi-cultural

and multi lingual (Siraj-Blatchford and Clarke, 2000 Banks and McGee, 2009) and gender education

(MacNaugton, 2000). The area least developed at that time was economics in ECCE. For example,

while ‘thrift’ may have been considered an important virtue to be encouraged in children a century

ago, in the western world at least (Tucker, 1991), it would seem to have rarely featured in the aims

of early childhood education until reintroduced as an aspect of ESD (Siraj-Blatchford, et al, 2010).

Yet any awareness of ESD as a distinct area of concern at the start of the decade was extremely

limited in ECCE, and now even after nearly 10 years, the subject remains fragmented within and

between countries around the world. However there are signs that it is building momentum, and we

expect the institution of the new UN Sustainable Development Goals will accelerate this process.

Figure 1: The three pillars of ESD

In 2007, UNESCO established a Chair in Early Childhood Education and Sustainable Development at

Goteborg University with the purpose of promoting Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) as

an important aspect of Early Childhood Education (ECCE). Much of these efforts have been carried

out in collaboration with the Organisation Mondiale pour l’Éducation Préscolaire (OMEP) which

UNESCO considers its strongest partner for co-operation globally (UNESCO, 2014b). UNESCO (2012)

also identified the particular contribution of the OMEP to the development of ESD in ECCE over the

past ten years. OMEP was founded in 1948 in Prague as an international, non-governmental and

non-profit organisation concerned with all aspects of ECCE. The organisation has a long history in

defence, and in promotion of the rights of the child to education and care worldwide and in recent

years the organisation has provided significant leadership in the area of ESD. The organisation has

membership represented by 73 national committees, from all five regions, Europe, Asia/Pacific,

Africa, Latin America, North America and Caribbean.

Figure 2: The child’s voice: “This dirty planet was ugly. When it is dirty we can be ill. When water is

dirty the fish will die. The children want health and happiness for everybody” (Poland)

A special issue of OMEP’s International Journal of Early Childhood was published in 2009 focused

upon Sustainable Development in Early Childhood and OMEP has been working on various

international development projects in ESD since 2008. Their work began with an interview study

based on a logo (Fig. 2) where children were portrayed cleaning the world: In the Children’s Voices

about the State of the Earth and Sustainable Development project 9,142 children between two and

eight years of age were interviewed by 641 OMEP interviewers in 28 Countries and 385 preschools

around the world. A report on this project provided a focus for the OMEP World Assembly and

World Congress in Gothenburg in 2010 (Engdahl and Rabušicová, 2010), and ESD has featured as a

dedicated strand of each annual conference. The OMEP website carries guidance for practitioners

and practical examples of activities to be carried out with young children and these links can also be

accessed at: http://www.ecesustainability.org/

Further OMEP World projects have involved children engaged in preschool practices based upon the

7Rs: to Respect, Reflect, Rethink, Reuse, Reduce, Recycle, and Redistribute. A third world project

involved intergenerational dialogues, where three generations were involved in looking at how food

can be grown at home and in the preschool. Another project, developed in collaboration with

UNESCO and Wash in Schools, has been the WASH from the Start, initiative which will be referred to

later along with details of the pre-primary classroom rating scale that has been developed for ESD

target setting ,and in the wider evaluation of ESD in ECCE (Siraj-Blatchford et al forthcoming). The

current (2013-14) OMEP world project is concerned with supporting International projects

concerned with Equality for Sustainability and the Rights of the Child.

Robust research shows that many of the most successful interventions that have been developed

around the world to support ECCE beyond the pre-primary context have adopted a two-generational

approach, and these have been shown capable of long-term impact for future generations. A

Jamaican study 1986-7 involved a randomised controlled trial with 127 children who were recruited

to the study at 3 months. It included an intervention that involved support for 1 hour weekly home-

based play sessions with mothers and children over a 2 year period. This intervention aimed to

improve the quality of maternal-child interaction through play and this has now been shown to have

provided large cognitive effects when compared to a control group into adulthood. A 20 year follow

up found that these early childhood experiences continued to influence child development in these

families for the next generation (Grantham-McGregor et al., 1994, 2007). Another robust and large

scale evaluation of an intervention involving home visits has been carried out in Columbia

(Attanasio et al, 2013). Familias en Acción, was inspired by the Jamaican design and began in 2002. It

is now the largest welfare program in Columbia. Within this 18 months intervention, home visits are

made by locally trained Madre Lideres to support mothers in providing psycho-social stimulation. As

in the Jamaican intervention one of the strategies applied to reduce the costs was to encourage the

mothers and children to make their own toys. The evaluation found very significant benefits in terms

of cognition and respective language at a cost of only $491 USD per child per year. Which the

research team notably compare with the Colombian government ECD budget for children birth to

age 5 of $1,300 USD per child per year.

3. Methodology This review has been informed by international surveys and regional reports provided by UNESCO

and a significant new research review that has assessed the nature and strength of the evidence

base and provides an overview of the main trends to be found in the research and professional

literature associated with ESD ECCE. While the quality of the evidence available was found

inadequate for the purposes of any objective evaluation or systematic review of the progress being

made in the UN DESD, the review has adopted a qualitative approach that provides appropriate

standards of reliability and validity. In identifying appropriate sources for review a strong emphasis

was placed on research providing a robust empirical basis, and where the evidential basis of

arguments and inferences are weaker we have indicated this in the text. Scoping searches were

carried out using bibliographic databases and extended searches were also carried out using search

engines such as Google and Google Scholar.

4. Policy Context for ESD Developments in ECCE At the most fundamental level, the provision of adequate support for ECCE is itself a requirement for

sustainable development. The second DESD survey of Member States, Key Stakeholders and UN

Agencies carried out by UNESCO (2014a) reported that in Africa, 63% of respondents reported that

the main challenge to ESD implementation was the lack of financial and human resources and

infrastructure, such as the need to build schools. If the same survey had been carried out to look

exclusively at ECCE then there can be no doubt that this response would have been substantially

higher.

Sustainable Development requires a better educated, informed and participating public and

investments in ECCE provide the best means of ensuring that families (Barnett, et al, 2007 Heckman

2006, Rolnick and Grunewald, 2006, and Feinstein, 2003). Yet inequalities in access to ECCE remain

a major problem. Many countries, including Latin America and the Caribbean and sub-Saharan

Africa, have developed ECCE policies, and more and more of these, including many in Asia and the

Pacific, understand that these must be multi-sectorial and comprehensive in nature (UNESCO 2011a

p6), but according to UNESCO (2012b) statistics, only 48% of the world’s children currently enjoy

some ECCE provision. Access to pre-primary programs is also highly inequitable, with a GER of only

15% in low-income countries. Improved access to pre-primary programmes has the potential of

reducing poverty and countering inequality. It would also result in easier transition to primary

school, lower the risks of grade repetition, improve learning achievements, retention and

completion rates in schools (UNESCO, 2007c, 2012b, p 56). Children from poor families, immigrant

children, and children from other vulnerable groups may particularly benefit from ECCE’s equalising

potential before primary schooling.

ECCE provision is increasingly considered by policy makers in an holistic way; integrating care and

education along with health, safety and play provisions in preschool settings, in the home, and in the

wider community. In contrast with common assumptions that ECCE programmes should be targeted

at children over the age of 3, and include organized ‘school readiness’ learning activities (UNESCO,

2012b, p 63), the extant evidence suggests that for maximum impact, early education programmes

should include family support, Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH), and nutrition/feeding

provisions where necessary. Similarly, all health and feeding programmes should include provisions

to support children's early learning and development. This ’joined up thinking’ perspective is

explicitly referred to in UNESCO’s (2011b) Summary of Progress Towards Education for All, prepared

for the Tenth Meeting of the High-Level Group on Education for all in Jomtien. In reporting on the

disappointing progress being made towards the EFA goals, the UNESCO authors report upon the

growing evidence for adopting more integrated approaches to ECCE and suggest that many

Ministries of Education have been slow in assuming the role that they should’ with regard to the

wellbeing of children aged from birth to three:

”Such children are usually seen as the responsibility of other ministries; health and/or social welfare,

for example, when, in fact, the education sector can also contribute significantly to their well-being.

Education ministries, for example, can ensure that any adult education/literacy courses and even

formal school curricula (especially in secondary school) contain messages important to future

parents in regard to the health and nutrition of both mothers and young children and the essential

need for these children to receive stronger cognitive and psycho-social support and stimulation from

birth“ (UNESCO, 2011b, p 7).

The (2011b) report also argues that the Regional EFA reports that they analysed demonstrated a

‘considerable lack of understanding’, with most national policies for ECCE:

Failing to provide a systematic definition of ECCE or collect comprehensive data on child

Development

Lacking information and data related to many of the non?formal, community and private

sector based programmes which are expanding in many countries;

Lacking a comprehensive, coherent, multi?sectoral, and multi?partner ECCE framework and

strategy (across ministries, with the NGO and private sector) embedded in larger national

development plans.

Having no overall policy coordinating mechanism (such as the National ECCE Council in the

Philippines) across the relevant, multiple partners; such a mechanism is essential for

effective service delivery

Having no systematic structure for training the range of caregivers and pre?school teachers

required for a good ECCE system (e.g., fewer than 10% of ECCE personnel in Africa are

considered qualified), or assessing the system’s strengths and weaknesses.

Neglecting not only the health and nutritional needs of children aged 0-3 but also, due to

lack of Ministry of Education interest, their need for cognitive and psycho-social

development

Providing a serious lack of funding, at least from the government sector – which leads to the

risk of an unsupervised, private sector dominated ECCE provision.

As this crucial UNESCO (2011b) report concludes:

“The development by 2015 of comprehensive, integrated ECCE policies and related strategies and

programmes which systematically respond to the above concerns is therefore an important priority

for all countries of the world” (p 7).

In fact many of the most effective interventions in health, nutrition, family support and early

childhood educational provisions around the world already combine these services and deliver

them through pre-primary center’s. The Aanganwadi Centers of the Integrated Child Development

Services program in India to the Centro de Atencion Integral al Preescolar of the Columbian

Community Child Care and Nutrition Project provide good examples. As Britto and Ulkuer (2012) put

it; “evidence shows that such intersectional coordination has generated some positive results, such

as improved public awareness of ECCE, and increased use of comprehensive services”.

In many developed countries preschool and other centre-based child care programs have also

moved beyond providing integrated approaches that link child care with early learning towards the

provision of much wider support for working families and the enrichment of children’s home

learning environments. Major initiatives include Sure Start Centres (UK) and Head Start Centres

(USA) (Adams and Rohacek 2002, Halfon, et al., 2009).

4.1. Monitoring and Measuring Progress towards ESD in ECCE The Africa Regional Consultation on a Post-DESD Framework identified the following continuous

challenges on research and innovation in ESD:

Inadequate ESD research and innovation both in academic institutions and among other -

stakeholders including the business sector in search for more sustainable innovative

technologies and products;

Inadequate planning for monitoring

(Yao et al, 2014 p4)

The Post-DESD Africa Consultation suggested that a post-2014 ESD programme framework should

further focus on the development of indicators to assess ESD implementation at local, national, sub-

regional, and regional levels. It was noted that at present there existed many uncoordinated ESD

activities. These include the Mainstreaming Environment and Sustainability in African Universities

(MESA) programme, Associated Schools, Eco-Schools, and Eco-villages, among others. Defining the

terms of reference and indicators for monitoring and evaluation at different levels would help

assessing the status of ESD implementation at all levels and feed into the global monitoring and

evaluation of ESD progress (Yao et al, 2014 p4)

The Learning Matrix Task Force consider the early childhood years are critical to later learning and

development and emphasise the importance of applying holistic measures across several domains to

capture learning at this stage: But while the Task Force recommend that all children and youth

develop competencies across seven domains of learning, they appear to consider only; physical well-

being, social and emotional, literacy and communication, learning approaches and cognition, and

numeracy and mathematics particularly relevant (LMTF, 2013, p25), the two areas apparently

considered in some way less relevant at this age are Culture and the Arts and Science and

Technology. It isn’t clear why these are not considered appropriate but this may be a problem given

the strong evidence available that children benefit significantly from early education in these

curriculum areas. Culture and Arts (Davies, 2010, Griffiths, 2012), and Science and Technology

education may also be considered a key area of ESD in ECCE (Siraj-Blatchford and MacLeod-

Brudenell, 1999, Helm and Katz, 2001, Siraj-Blatchford 2008, and see Section 5 below).

While, as the Matrix task Force reports, we know that several countries do apply measures of

children’s learning at entry to primary education, there has been no measure that has been adopted

globally. In fact few instruments are available for international application in the evaluation of any

aspect of ESD in ECCE. Save the Child’s Literacy boost programme has developed a tool that can be

used in conjunction with teacher training and in initiatives involving communities and families in

early literacy. The tool has been used in 15 countries: Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Haiti,

Malawi, Mali, Nepal, Pakistan, Philippines, Mozambique, South Africa, Uganda, Vietnam, Zimbabwe,

and Yemen, and there are plans to apply it in Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bolivia, Burundi, Indonesia, and

Kenya.

OMEP has developed an international Environmental Rating Scale for Sustainable Development in

Early Childhood (ERS-SDEC) (Siraj-Blatchford, et al, in press). The tool applies the same rating

procedures as the widely used and adapted Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale – Revised

(ECERS-R) (Harms, Clifford and Cryer, 1998) and - Extension (ECERS-E) (Sylva, Siraj-Blatchford, &

Taggart, 2003) research and development instruments. In many research contexts the ERS-SDEC may

therefore be applied conveniently alongside these more elaborate and comprehensive quality rating

scales. The ERS-SDEC may also be applied by individual or groups of practitioners to audit their

education for sustainable development curriculum, and to help practitioners and preschool centre

mangers in setting curriculum development priorities. OMEP is committed to the further

development, refinement and revision of this instrument in the future in collaboration with

practitioners.

It has also been suggested that four specific Indicators to be applied in measuring progress in the

post-2014 framework:

the percentage of local ESD content in the school curriculum

the percentage of teachers who can speak and teach in their learner’s mother tongue

the percentage of time dedicated to activities taught by community members and linked to

local content

the percentage of a government’s total budget devoted to ESD activities?

(Shaeffer, 2013, P9)

5. ESD Progress: Implementation and Practice of ESD in ECCE (2005-

2014)

5.1. Curriculum Support for ESD in ECCE Following the Education for Sustainable Development World Conference 2009, the Bonn

Declaration, and its elaborated strategy for the second half of the Decade, UNESCO has focused its

work on three key sustainable development issues to be addressed through education: climate

change, biodiversity and disaster risk reduction. Each of these areas are already being addressed in

some ECCE settings around the world. But as much of the evidence reported in this review

demonstrates, there is an urgent need to promote and develop this work further. Issues associated

with climate change are often addressed when children are encouraged on an everyday basis to save

drinking water after meal-times to put on the garden, turning off taps, or involving the children in

projects to improve rainwater collection. Issues associated with biodiversity are similarly addressed

on a regular basis as children are encouraged to care and protect the living environment around

them. In a small minority of settings around the world, the children are engaged in local campaigns

and actions to develop greater public awareness of the issues. This supports children in learning

that; “… they are active participants and can make a difference to society” (Young, 2007). In

Australia, the Rouse Water (Supply, Water Aware Centre program is a water education program for

staff, children and their families. It aims to enhance their interest, knowledge and skills about water

conservation and to encourage and guide their practices and policies towards sustainable water use.

The Water Aware Centre Program has supported (30+ over 3 years) Centres to achieve four

outcomes:

1. The children take part in a water education session.

2. The Centre has a water audit and creates a water conservation action plan. The

management committee is given the plan and Rous Water encourages them to carry out at

least two of the actions.

3. The parent community is informed about the program, their local water supply and water

saving rebates and conservation incentives.

4. The staff incorporates water conservation activities into their curriculum planning, policies

and practices.

The Early Childhood Australia Sustainability Interest Group (Young and Moore, 2010) have shared

their experience of pre-primary ESD practice and recommend a wide range of biodiversity concepts

to explore. These include:

Decay, scavenging, conservation, protection, hibernation, habitats

Making compost, worm farms and vegetable patches

Life and food cycles

Prey, predators and camouflage

Conducting biodiversity audits of their playspace

Planting a diverse range of plants

Discussing plant and animal conservation

Sponsorship of an endangered or local species

The creation of frog bogs, bird baths and feeders

Playspace design discussions

(Young and Moore, 2010)

UNESCO (2012c) has published a report directly focused upon ‘Education for Sustainable

Development Good Practices in Early Childhood’. This was published in response to “numerous

requests for case studies and descriptions of good practices in ESD”(p4). The document provides

details of 12 programmes promoting ESD in early childhood settings. Four of these projects

presented as exemplars were very large scale national or regional initiatives: Leuchtpol (Lighthouse);

Ecological Blue Flag; Leben gestalten lernen – Werte leben (Learning to shape life – living values) ;

and ; Sustainable Human Development in Rio Santiago. The first three of these are most significantly

concerned with Environmental issues and the fourth with Social and Cultural. The selection of

exemplars clearly illustrates the emphasis upon environmental education and the relative

underdevelopment of projects focused upon the social and cultural and economic dimensions of

ESD. Only three of the exemplars offer more combined and integrated ESD approaches.

A 28 million EURO (2008-2012) German ESD project for 3 to 6 year olds: The ‘Leuchtpol’

(Lighthouse) project was a project focused on “Energy and the Environment” developed by

Arbeitsgemeinschaft Natur- und Umweltbildung Bundesverband (National Working Group for Nature

and Environmental Education), (an NGO) and the E.On Energy company. The project is also

supported by Leuphana University Lunebrg. The project has provided five-day further training

events for preschool teachers aimed to involve 4,000 pre-schools (about 10% of national provision)

by the end of 2012. The project also provides a kit of materials, brochures providing examples of

good practice and quality standards as well as conferences and exhibitions.

The Ecological Blue Flag Programme for Educational Centers was also included in the

UNESCO (2012c) exemplars of good practice. This project developed by the Ministry of Public

Education, Health and the Environment Education Department in Costa Rica in 2004. The project

involves preschools, primary anf high schools, as well as special education institutions, teacher

education and Universities. The Programme currently involves 600 educational centre’s out of a total

of 4,518 in Costa Rica. A specific goal has been to ‘highlight the importance of protecting natural

resources and of promoting healthy practices such as the use of toilets in schools’. The project

provides a teacher training programme covering issues concerned with climate change, the Earth

Charter, waste management, energy and water resources saving. Preschool are evaluated inorder to

gain the Blue Flag certification.

A project developed by the Landesbund für Vogelschutz in Bayern Germany, in association with the

Bavarian Ministry for Environment and Health,

Leben gestalten lernen – Werte leben (Learning to shape life – living values) has provided ESD

materials (DVD and ring binder) to more than 3,000 kindergartens in Germany, and has certified the

practices of 280. The overall aims of the project have been to involve families together with their

children, educators and foster values appropriate to ESD such as a sense of responsibility, openness,

trust and confidence, and respect for the environment.

Sustainable Human Development in Rio Santiago is a project that has been developed in Peru

and Ecuador to ensure that the human rights of indigenous children are protected throughout the

Amazon region. The project addresses children’s right to a good start in life, to a name and a

nationality, to health, and to quality basic education. More than 1,200 children under the age of 6,

and their families benefit from the project, which provides support for child-mother health services

and provisions that include the training of teachers for community-based family and children’s

education.

There are various other ‘Green School’ initiatives around the world that provide curriculum support

for ESD as well as structural support for the development of sustainable school buildings etc. Many

of these initiatives involve young children and are funded partly by industrial sponsors. In the

Phillipines, for example, the ‘Green Schools’ programme is a partnership program with the

Department of Education, Commission on Higher Education, and private sector partners such as

Smart Communications, Inc., Nestle Philippines, Inc., Petron Foundation, One Meralco Foundation,

and Unilever Philippines. In the UNESCO Asia-pacific Regional Consultation on a Post-DESD

Framework, Shaeffer, (2013, p3) also recommends the Indonesian “Green schools” (or eco-friendly

and safe schools) initiative as worthy of scaling up. Eco-Schools (http://www.eco-schools.org.uk ) are

part of an international programme for environmental management, certification, and sustainable

development education for schools. There is a focus on early years education and it is free for

settings to join up and apply for a reward. The organisation provides a range of case studies of good

practice, resources to support teaching and a range of advice on writing eco- policies and carrying

out an environmental review. In Australia the Environmental Education in Early Childhood (EEEC)

project aims to promote a holistic approach to environmental education and sustainable practices in

early childhood and the early years of primary school. The approach involves policy development,

housekeeping practices, play and learning experiences and strategies for working with children, staff

and parents. There are also many other national and regional early childhood environmental

education networks.

Green Kindergartens was an 18 month pilot project that was also identified as an exemplar by

UNESCO (2012c). The project is run in four kindergartens in Vanuatu. This project was supported by

Live and Learn Environmental Education (www.livelearn.org) and the Vanuatu Early Childhood

Association. Workshops were provided to train 26 teachers to provide environmental education for

young children in close collaboration with the parents of the children. Activities in the pilot were

concerned with waste and gardening and a handbook and posters were produced to support

integrated project work.

Three of the examples of good practice provided in the UNESCO (2012c) catered for a wider age

group of children. Siembras: A Communitarian Programme for Health, Coexistence in Uruguay has

addressed the three pillars of ESD in ECCE and has to sought to strengthen local community

development; to improve personal, familiar and community links, to stimulate sustainable

development; to improve health; and to promote better ways of living together. The project’s

participatory education approach involves children aged 3-12 years of age and draws upon the Skills

for Life approach developed by the World Health Organisation (WHO, 1993). Siembras reaches more

than 23,000 children from the participant towns, including 700 educators from the educational

centres attended by the children, and around 6,000 families. Educational provisions are made to

support community understanding of health, education for citizenship, and sustainable

development. Environmental education has been supported by the development of organic gardens

in educational centres in collaboration with parents and the local community.

The Earth Kids Space Programme would appear to be another fully integrated ECCE ESD project,

it’s a voluntary community programme providing afterschool and weekend learning experiences for

approximately 350 children aged 3-15 in schools, community centres and libraries in Japan, and a

further 5 classrooms in Argentina, India, Indonesia, Isreal and the Phillipines. The programme

objectives are focused upon developing the children’s independence, harmonious relationships,

global understanding, love and peace, and ‘a spirit of appreciation towards the earth’ . The

curriculum is strongly informed by two publications; a Declaration for Life on Earth

(www.goinpeace.or.jp and Murakami’s Sekai wa Hitotsu no Seimei kara Hajimatta. The children are

encouraged to recognise their individual potential and imagine alternative futures and in practical

activities they learn about food production.

As one part of a co-ordinated community project that aims to provide A sustainable urban

atmosphere - A more harmonious environmental balance children in primary schools and

kindergartens are visited by teachers and pupils from the 4th and 5th grades of a local high school to

provide workshops concerned with ‘climate change, water and ground pollution and care, waste,

“natural” buildings and alternative energies’ (UNESCO, 2012c, p39). The project, located in Villa

Lugano, south-east of Buenos Aires, in an area where there is a high degree of water contamination

(surface and underground waters) as well as air and ground pollution.

The UNESCO (2012c) examples also include the exemplary case of the South African Raglan Road

Community Centre established in 2004 as an integrated community service centre. This is the third

integrated ESD ECCE project identified. The centre creates socio-environmental safety nets for Early

Childhood addressing issues including child abuse, HIV/AIDS and, poverty and nutrition are all areas

targeted both within the school curriculum and as part of the integrated community projects

implemented by the An integration of leveraging good nutrition, providing sound educational

opportunities and ensuring that learners have support for their cognitive development in their

homes through providing literacy opportunities for primary care-givers and older siblings and family

members. . Activities are targeted at both children and their primary and secondary care-givers as

well as at the broader social network surrounding them. Maths, computer and literacy classes have

been established so that care-givers can assist learners to develop reading and math skills, and to

enable the adults to access a broader spectrum of employment opportunities. To help the physical

development of the children, meals are provided as part of the schools day, and to enable a

sustainable nutritious and healthy diet (beyond the limited bread allowance allocated by the

Department of Education) a food garden has also been established on the school grounds. The food

garden was then used as a learning resource for the learners, and to provide a ‘resource income’ to

members of the community, who worked in the garden in exchange for a portion of the yield. With

financial resources being a challenge in the the local health clinic, the centre has drawn upon

indigenous community knowledge in developing a herb garden producing traditional medicines.

Another project from an Ecole maternelle in Paris involved three classroom groups of 88 4-6 year

olds in the production of short animated films using webcams in association with the Playmobile toy

company. The project Comment ça va … la Terre? (How are you Earth?) involved both the

children and their parents in learning about sustainable development and campaigning for ‘eco-

citizenship’

The Eco-Patrulha project involved a class of 3 and 4 year olds and their parents in Porto in

Portugal focused on the education of socially active citizens . The children participated in a variety

of ESD activities associated with the care of plants, recycling, the reduction of waste, water and

energy consumption and the offsetting of CO2 emissions. The children also collaborated in the

development of lists of environmentally appropriate and inappropriate behaviors –and ‘patrolled’

the pre-school (and local community) to ensure that they were adhered to: “…the children feel like

“superheroes” with a big responsibility, that of helping “to save the planet”, as they themselves put

it.” UNESCO, 2012c, p33) This led to the development of recycling activities, energy savings and the

implementation of an organic garden.

Another single Kindergarten project, Pupeñi is located in La Pintana, Chili and aims to contribute to

minimizing global warming through an efficient use of energy, promoting water and electricity

consumption reduction in the households. The Project was developed jointly by the teachers council

and the Centre of Parents and Representatives of the Pupeñi kindergarten. The project has provided

participatory workshops and awareness raising campaigns on the appropriate use of energy and

energy efficiency. They provided training programmes to promote the use of ollas brujas (a kind of

thermos or pot made of expanded polystyrene) as an alternative to gas cookers.

In a survey of 212 stakeholders in 33 European countries , the DG Education and Culture (2008)

identified one, out of 30 ‘innovative’ projects, involving children under the age of 8 (p4). This was an

Austrian national network (OKOLOG) project for schools involving 6 to 25 year olds. It is significant

that the future of many of the exemplary projects and programmes identified in UNESCO (2012c) are

dependent on continuation of targeted ESD funding and in many countries around the world

recession has resulted in reduced expenditure for ESD (UNESCO, 2010 strategy).

In the absense of resources to carry out a more comprehensive study, an opportunity sample survey

of provisions for ESD in ECCE, was carried out specifically for this report by Siraj-Blatchford and

Pramling Samuelsson (2013). The survey involved individual expert respondents identified by the

OMEP executives from 14 countries, China, Czech Republic, Finland, Russia, Slovakia, France, Ireland,

Australia, Brazil, Bulgaria, Singapore, Sweden, the UK and Kenya. The survey was based on a short

email questionnaire asking for details of the progress being made in implementing ESD in ECCE, and

also the contribution to this process being made by Government, NGO's, teacher education

institutions and the UNESCO DESD. Many of the responses provided anecdotal accounts of the (still

quite limited) progress that was being made, and few included any concrete evidence of policy

implementation in preschools or preschool teacher education. Where this was available ESD was

rarely directly referred to as a subject, with responses refering to environmental education. The

exceptions to this were in Australia, Finland, A and where responses were referring directly to OMEP

or DESD activities and publications. Apart from Kenya, various kinds of ‘environmental’ preschool

programs were found to be common in all these countries, and associated seminars, workshops, and

material have been provided for some years. In some of the countries, aspects of ESD are also

incorporated into the national curriculum for Early Childhood. Respondents were asked about the

relative contributions made to the development of ESD in ECCE by national government, the early

childhood profession, and the local community since 2005. In Finland much has been achieved, the

Finnish National Board of Education has Strategy for Education and Training for Sustainable

Development and Implementation Plan 2006–2014. The strategy contains plans for increasing

cooperation and promoting networking at the local, regional, national level. The French and

Slovakian governments had also been influential. But most of our expert informants felt that little

had been initiated by their relevant government ministries. By far the greatest influence has come

from the profession itself who were inspired and supported in this work by international

professional initiatives by OMEP and UNESCO. In many country's this work was also significantly

supported by ECCE specialists in the University sector.

In Singapore ‘environmental awareness’ was introduced into the national curriculum for preschools

in 2006 and this was changed to ‘Discovery of the World’ in 2012. These aspects include some

environmental activities and activities to understand the social and physical world around. In Russia

new standards have been introduced and there has been greater recognition of the need to ensure

equality of access to ECCE, and of the importance of increasing quality of education as a national

priority in preschool education. There has also been a project Nature and Us, that has been

dedicated to the Decade of ESD, as a follow up of the UNESCO world conference on ECCE in 2011.

Ecological education has also been introduced into the curriculum for students and teachers in some

universities and colleges. This progress being made in Russia is confirmed in a response to the

second DESD survey of Member States, Key Stakeholders and UN Agencies carried out by UNESCO

(2014a p30)@

An article by Ärlemalm-Hagsér and Davis (in press) identifies the different ways that young children

are described and supported as active participants for change within the Australian and Swedish

national steering documents for early childhood education. In both countries environmental

education is strongly emphasised in the early years. Concepts concerned with ‘critical thinking’, and

of ‘children as active participants for change’ were used as specific dimensions of curriculum

interpretation in the study. The analyses show that, while both the Australian and Swedish curricula

deal with content connected to the environmental, social inclusion and critical thinking dimensions,

there is limited or no discussion in the Australian curriculum of the ‘political’ dimensions of human

development, such as children being active citizens with political agency.

In Finland there is a co-ordinated strategy and plans for increasing cooperation and promoting

networking at the local, regional, national and international level. Also projects about urban living

for sustainability exist, and a practical guide has been developed to provide a step by step model in

creating sustainable development programmes in a school or kindergarten.

Korea and Norway also have ECCE curriculum that gives strong support to ESD.

In Bulgaria 100% of children receiving pre-primary education are considered to be involved in

environmental education as all the kindergartens and preparatory groups at school observe the

educational requirements for preschool education.

By way of contrast we might consider the case of Kenya where the national curriculum guidance

includes some activities related to water, health, hygiene, and the environment, and these are

applied in most of the schools where there are trained teachers. But the majority of the current pre-

primary teaching workforce have not been trained and remain largely unaware of this. Pre-primary

teacher salaries in Kenya are typically between £16 - £30 a month (2,000 – 4,000 Ksh) and the staff

turnover in pre-primary sector has been estimated as 40% annually. In any event, 65% of Kenyan

children aged 3-6 years have no access to pre-primary ECCE services and in arid and semi-arid areas

only 9% have access. As many as 122,000 under 5 year olds die each year, due mostly to lack of

water, sanitation and hygiene. It has been estimated that as many as 75% of children are unable to

wash their hands with soap or ash after visiting the latrine and before eating.

The most highly regarded ECCE ESD work being carried out involves thematic and holistic project

activities that aim to find balanced solutions to problems that consider each of the relevant

economic, environmental and socio-cultural dimensions. But for the purposes of evaluation (or

auditing) current practice it is useful to consider the extent to which each of these pillars is

addressed. In our opportunity survey we found that the number of preschools incorporating

Environmental education as one aspect of ESD varied in the different countries from 25 to 100%. In

terms of Social education: the variation was considered to be from 25 to 75 % and perceived

coverage of Economics issues even lower. We also asked our experts about the degree to which

children were currently participating in the development of their ESD curriculum activities and we

were told the variation was between 25 to 50% of pre-primary schools .

Research (Ewert et al 2005, Chawla, 2006) shows that the single most important influence in

promoting environmental awareness and concern is identified as childhood experience ‘outdoors’

and early years practitioners have long recognised the learning potential of the outdoor learning

environment. Outdoor education in Scandinavia has a particularly high status, with the aim of

improving physical development, and the child’s connection with nature. Many of the forest

Scandinavian pre-schools are built and run in secluded woodland and the idea of developing ‘Forest

Schools’ activities have become popular in many other European, North and South American and

Asian Pacific contexts (Davis, 2009, Bruce, 2012).

The Social and cultural strand of sustainability is concerned with all of those social, cultural and

political issues that affect the quality and continuity of people’s lives, within and between nations.

To achieve social sustainability equality and fairness is therefore required between individuals and

groups within and beyond national borders and between generations. Sustainable development

requires, therefore, an ethos of compassion, respect for difference, equality and fairness. Adults can

contribute a great deal in supporting children in their development of positive perceptions of

themselves and of others and a great deal of early years curriculum development along these lines

has been carried out around the world. In the UK for example the Early Years Foundation Stage

Guidance (2007) for England suggested that pre-primary school teachers: “Work with staff, parents

and children to promote an anti-discriminatory and anti-bias approach to care and education”.

As previously suggested, activities supporting children’s emerging awareness and understanding of

economic sustainability are the least developed in ECCE. Yet for most early childhood practitioners,

parents and children the day to day activities most significantly influencing sustainable development

are at the level of consumption. Sustainable consumption is therefore a particularly important area

upon which we can focus in the future.

Our opportunity sample (Siraj-Blatchford and Pramling Samuelsson, 2013) of 14 countries was, of

course, not at all representative of the global situation, and as Wals (2010) suggests, in his progress

report on the UNESCO Decade for Education Sustainable Development, as a clearly defined subject

ESD in the pre-primary education sector remains marginal even if attention to is ‘on the rise’ and

‘better articulated’ than it was earlier on in the Decade (p34):

“Whereas early in the DESD, the necessity of ESD for society’s youngest members was in question

(‘they are too young for such complex and heavy issues, let them be children and not bother with

this’), there now is a realization that ESD in ECCE has a role to play”. (p37)

Wals (2010) cites respondents from Myanmar and Lesotho to illustrate the variety of commitments

to ESD in ECCE from around the world:

“SD has become an integral component of ECCE: As ECD is one of the key factors to meet the EFA

goals and MDG goals, trainings for ECD interventions held everywhere covers ESD” (KIS, UNESCO

Field Office, Myanmar).

“There has not really been any conscious effort to integrate ESD into this stage of education, nor

have there been any type of training geared towards trainers at this level in Lesotho” (GMES,

Lesotho)

Wash from the Start

In considering the most addressed sustainability challenges most respondents to the second DESD

survey of Member States, Key Stakeholders and UN Agencies carried out by UNESCO (2014b),

referred to Health, Water and Sanitation and these were also considered the very highest area of

concern for all respondents at the ECCE phase (UNESCO, 2014b, p40-44).

As the example of Kenya illustrates so clearly above, sustainability in ECCE of many countries is most

significantly concerned with more immediate survival issues that those addressed in wealthier

nations. UNICEF’s established WASH in Schools (WinS) program saves children’s lives by promoting

water, sanitation, and hygiene in primary and secondary schools throughout the world. Yet there

has been an urgent need to provide improved clean water supplies and hygiene education for

younger children. Pre-primary school children suffer the most from diarrhea and enteric diseases,

with every episode reducing their calorie and nutrient uptake, limiting their growth and

development. In fact children under five are reported to be the victims of 90% of all diarrheal

deaths, more than 1.5 million deaths annually. So the earlier we act the better. But the challenges

are substantial. The forth Millennium Development Goal (MDG) adopted by world leaders in 2000

was to reduce by two thirds the mortality rate among children under five by the year 2015.

According to the Executive Board of United Nations Children’s Fund (2011), of the 68 countries that

account for 90 percent of the deaths, only 19 are projected to achieve MDG 4. As many as 200

million children under five are also currently at risk of impaired cognitive and social and emotional

development (op cit).

Integrated approaches have been found to be most effective, and the major role to be played by

Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) educational initiatives supporting disease prevention and

nutritional outcomes, has been recognised. Young children are the greatest victims of poor hygiene,

and it is also significant that, as they are also are highly mobile, they serve as very efficient

"spreaders" of enteric organisms. Children often get their hands dirty but they are not born with any

inherited instincts to wash their hands before they eat or even after they go to the toilet. Hand

washing is a routine that needs to be well taught from an early age to make sure it is done properly.

Efforts to improve early childhood hygiene education also has the bonus effect of alerting older

siblings, parents and communities to the dangers.

A successful pilot project carried out in Colombia provides a good example of what can be achieved

in ECCE(Landaeta and Cardenas, 2013). The first stage of the "Program for the prevention of

infectious diseases in children of Colombia" aimed to identify and understand the problem with 4

and 5 year old children, and then to develop workshops for teachers, aides, and administrative staff

and community mothers). It is intended that the project also supports the development of a wider

education strategy for use with children of Child Development Centres, caregivers and parents.

Another smaller scale Wash from the Start project carried out in a partnership between OMEP Kenya

and UK in 2012 focused on celebrations for Global Handwashing Day. The activities were co-

ordinated between Kangoro preschool in Meru in the Eastern Province of Kenya and The Grove

Preschool in Dorchester, England. See: http://kangorogrove.wordpress.com

Resilience and Risk Reduction

Children between the ages of 0-8 represent the highest percentage of affected populations in

today’s global emergencies (Plan, 2005, UNICEF, 2007, 2008). Emergencies and disasters also have

the greatest impact on young children because of their vulnerability and physical and psychological

dependency (UNICEF, 2010c).Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) aims at reducing risks and strengthening

supports in order to mitigate the impact of these disasters. In the context of ECCE this involves

ensuring that the preschools, ECD centres, health services, orphanages and homes of young children

are hazard resistant. Provisions for Education for Sustainable Development in early childhood must

provide support for young children in developing resilience, and Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR)

research has shown that they also have a role as as risk communicators supporting the behavioural

changes required of other people in their communities (Tanner, 2010).

Although disasters can affect anybody at any time in most cases it is the poorest and most

vulnerable people, including children that are affected first, and hit the hardest. It is for this reason

that most DRR projects have so far been developed in the poorer communities. But in considering

DRR as a significant component of ESD in ECCE, it may be important to recognise that this is not an

issue of relevance only in countries that have previously been considered especially prone to

‘natural’ disasters. In an analysis of data from 27 sites in 22 countries provided by more than 1200

families with children from infancy to age 12, the International Resilience Research Project (IRRP),

has highlighted the common concerns of society for helping children address experiences of

adversity (Grotberg, 1997a). A major aim of every DRR programme involving young children is to

support them in developing resilience, both the capacity to adapt and thrive under stress.

Back et al in 2009 have published a review of child-focused and child-led disaster risk reduction

approaches and techniques, many of which involved children as young as five. The review argues

that there are significant advantages in engaging children directly in the design and delivery of DRR

activities and that more needs to be done to involve children in such work. The review draws

attention to the fact that the costs of delivering DRR with children, is lower and the benefits stream

much higher (using a lifetime analysis and taking into account intergenerational benefits). The

review also found that most projects involved children in expanding and transferring knowledge and

in giving children a voice. The report recommends that efforts should now shift, to focus more on

supporting children engaged in action themselves to Influence and to transform practices.

Tanner (2010) cites a wide range of research evidence to argue that children from the age of 3

onwards are able to develop capacities to reduce risk based not just on the physical aspects of risk,

but also (and perhaps even more significantly) upon the culturally constructed aspects of risk

requiring behavioural change:

“The focus of attention therefore needs to shift from one that considers children’s agency not only

in terms of their ability to enact direct, autonomous risk management practices, to one that that

considers children as risk communicators to create behavioural change in other people in their

communities. Such risk communication processes at household, school and community level remain

poorly understood in different cultural contexts” (Lindell and Perry, 2004).

5.2. Pedagogical Approaches to ESD in ECCE The most fundamental principle informing the pedagogy that is most highly regarded in ESD in ECCE

is that Young Children have the right to be consulted ‘in all matters that affect’ them (Article 12

UNCRC). Sustainable Development is essentially concerned with the future, and it is young children

who have the greatest stake as citizens in that future. As Hart (1997) suggested and Davies (2005)

and others have shown, Young children in the pre-primary phase are already competent, active

agents in their own lives and they are affected by, and both capable and often required by

circumstance, to engage with complex environmental and social issues. Despite the high regard for

this principle and a widespread awareness amongst early childhood educators of the desirability of

encouraging child participation in curriculum development. The exemplary practices identified and

available research evidence suggest that so far this aspect remains relatively under-employed

around the world. As Unicef (2012) suggests there is a need for coordinated training of teachers to

design methodologies rooted in children’s rights.

In ECCE pre-primary practice activities encourage children to engage in co-operative play supported

through the provision of progressively more challenging scaffolding props and playful environments.

Early learning in terms of ESD is achieved in the same way as the child’s early learning of science and

technology. It is an ‘emergent’ phenomenon (Siraj-Blatchford, 2001). Teachers who teach ‘emergent

literacy’ in early childhood (Hall, 1987) provide positive role models to children by reading to them

and showing children the value they place in their own use of print. In emergent ESD we can do the

same by talking about sustainable development and by involving children in our own collaborative

investigations of the kind of sustainability issues identified by Young and Moore (2010) above. In an

emergent ESD education teachers tell the children about the significant achievements of sustainable

development, as well as the ongoing struggles, and heroic efforts of individuals like the Kenyan

Nobel Prize winner Wangari Mathhi. In doing so we will encourage children to develop an emergent

awareness of the nature and value of sustainable development and a positive dispositions towards

the subject. Teachers who teach emergent literacy encourage ‘mark making’ as a natural prelude to

writing. This is precisely the way Froebel and many other early educational pioneers saw the

importance of learning through ‘making’ things. In emergent ESD pre-primary teachers also

encourage exploration and problem solving and they support the child in sustaining these

explorations over time. While early childhood educators a few decades ago may have considered a

child’s mind to be an empty space to be filled with information, or had simplistic notions of children

learning all they needed through natural ‘discovery’, modern ECCE teacher education courses are

informed by the work of Vygotsky and the example of the Reggio Emilia model of education and

Increasingly early childhood learning and development has been recognised in socio-cultural terms

as a ‘construction zone’ involving the educator, the child and their significant others (Siraj-Blatchford

& MacLeod-Brudenell, 1999, Rinaldi, 2012).

In many of the most celebrated and successful pre-primary settings around the world the transition

from this early years play-based education to the more formal educational model of the school is

often supported through the development of small group project work. The children are at first

encouraged to record and report upon their extended playful learning activities (Van Oers, 1999),

and then to develop collaborative and investigative cross-curriculum project reports, displays or

‘documentation’ (Rinaldi, 2012) (See also reference to the Modern Education Movement model

below).

Many of the exemplary ESD in ECCE practices identified as case studies in the literature and in OMEP

resources provide examples of the children engaged in thematic topic or project work. Topic work

has generally been considered important in the early years because it is recognized that it is often

through making connections between classroom experience and the ‘real world’ outside, that

metacognitive links are developed that allow the ‘transfer’ of learning that is essential if the child’s is

ever to apply what they have learnt to other contexts. While many teachers may have assumed in

the past that such connections were somehow made ‘naturally’, we now know that this is often far

from the case (Nunes and Brynat, 1996) and a thematic topic work approach has been emphasized

in many early childhood teacher education courses. Arguably, the most sophisticated of these

approaches involve the children working together with the teacher in a collaborative enquiry. The

roots of project and enquiry based approaches to early childhood education lie in the work of Dewey

(1916), Kilpatrick's (1918), Bruner, (1961) and Thelen (1960). As Hartman and Eckerty (1999) have

observed, interest in the project approach has increased in recent years as educators have

rediscovered children's receptiveness to holistic learning approaches. As Katz and Chard (2000) have

argued:

“…project work can strengthen children’s dispositions to be empirical, that is, to seek and to

examine available evidence and facts, to check their predictions and hypotheses, and to learn to be

open to alternative ways of interpreting facts and findings” (p10)

Many of the most impressive ESD in ECCE practices that may be considered to provide contexts for a

collaborative form of praxis where the children and their parents and communities are encouraged

to reflect and take action upon the world in order to transform it (Freire, 1974):

“Many childhood care centres try to set a good example to the parents by being sustainable and

looking for healthy food etc. In that way they hope to attract more children and to give the parents a

good feeling” (Netherlands, KS) (UNESCO, 2014c, p29)

For the past 3 years, OMEP has provided a total of 10 annual travel awards to ECCE educators who

provide the best exemplars of ESD practice. In one project 75 Children (4 and 6 years) of the 3rd 4th

Preschools of Lykovrissi in Greece were engaged in an ESD project supported by a community

environmental group which included a campaign to save part of a local forest from development.

The project was developed with the full participation of the children. They made up songs for

recycling based on music themes of popular songs. They created leaflets, placards, posters, interview

schedules and songs about recycling. They also adapted the dramatic myth of Erysichthon to give it a

more optimistic ending and created a play, they did the choreography, and the set, and presented it

with the help of a mother-narrator. They prepared and wrote the questions they asked the Mayor

the day of a special event in the town centre. They also made suggestions for the solution to the

problems related to recycling and the protection of the local forest.

“..making everybody sensitive to the protection of the environment is the ultimate duty of the

people of the 21st century. Today, our preschoolers show the way. They deserve our

congratulations, our attention and love because they are the architects of the building of a new

world of dreams, hope and imagination!” (from the Mayor’s speech)

In fact the progress being made in Greece may be significant, in the second DESD survey of Member

States, Key Stakeholders and UN Agencies carried out by UNESCO (2014b) we learn:

“In 2005 in early childhood education ESD was still be a vague concept. Emphasis was given to

Environmental Education, mainly focus to the implementation of Environmental Education

Programs. Today, even though ESD is in progress it is important to mention that pilot is applied the

national curriculum in ESD and will be introduced officially at a later stage.” (Greece, KS) (UNESCO

(2014b p30)

The Modern School Movement (Movimento da Escola Moderna - MEM), has also been developing a

pedagogy over the past 40 years, which guides their educational practices and may be particularly

conducive to ESD in ECCE. The MEM philosophy was notably informed by the work of Frinet and the

aim has been to develop schools that are deeply integrated into the cultural background of the

societies they serve:

“Learning is seen as an empowering process, which provides tools for autonomous and responsible

citizens to actively engage and act on the world. In this sense schools should be places where

children learn how to learn and how to act in a democratic society” (Folque and Siraj-Blatchford,

2006).

The Asia-Pacific Regional Consultation on a Post-DESD Framework identified 8 pedagogic strategies

particularly supportive of ESD and supporting creative thinking and hands-on learning designed to

create “passionate learners”. The case study evidence shows that all of these apply equally to pre-

primary educational contexts:

more collaborative, experiential, self-autonomous, action- and learner-centred teaching and

learning

peer learning and hands-on, action/service learning

stronger community involvement and initiatives linked to the school; e.g., “learning from the

bottom” through community-based learning and localised curriculum development

the greater use of media and ICT in promoting ESD

teacher and student exchanges around ESD and DRR, both within and across countries

accreditation schemes for schools which achieve a certain level of adherence to the

principles and practices of ESD

awards for ESD implementation (e.g., SEAMEO awards for best DESD practices and

recognition of the most sustainable townships, the best DRR school plans, and the best ESD

websites)

ASPnet schools as a catalyst for ESD through useful for experimentation with, and the

sharing of, good practice (e.g., through videos)

(Shaeffer, 2013, p4)

In the second DESD survey of Member States, Key Stakeholders and UN Agencies carried out by

UNESCO (2014b) respondents (from all sectors of education) were asked to choose from a list

whether they see trends in learning favoured in the implementation of ESD or not. The most

favoured forms of learning used in ESD were reported as participatory/collaborative learning, critical

thinking and problem based learning (UNESCO, 2014b, p37). Each of these may be considered

equally relevant to ESD in the pre-primary phase. In a series of international meetings held in

Gothenburg in 2008, a set of specific recommendations (Ottosson and Samuelsson, 2008) for ESD in

ECCE were developed. In terms of specific preschool pedagogy the guidance highlighted the need

for:

Building upon the everyday experience of children

Curriculum integration and creativity

Intergenerational problem solving and solution seeking

Promotion of intercultural understanding and recognition of interdependency

Involvement of the wider community

Active citizenship in the early years

The creation of cultures of sustainability

These are also very similar to the conclusions reached in the Partnership for Education and Research

about Responsible Living initiative (PERL, 2011) where they identify the core life skills needed for all

ages which include the ability to:

reflect on the purpose of life and on our personal and collective needs and actions

take responsibility for one’s own betterment and for the advancement of society as a whole

consult in the public and private discourse on the nature, purpose and choices involved in

human development

be creative in envisioning and constructing alternative solutions to challenges

collaborate with others through continual questioning, learning and taking action

commit to both short and long-term goals.

(PERL, 2011)

5.3. ESD in ECCE Capacity Building and Initiatives Evidence coming from various cross-national studies, studies in North America and the longitudinal

Effective Provision of Pre-School Education (EPPE) project conducted in the United Kingdom has

underscored the importance of developing teachers.’ knowledge of the curriculum, as well as their

knowledge and understanding of child development (Naudeau et al., 2011: 86.–87). Research from

the Uk and United States has established that pre-primary programmes with well-educated,

adequately paid teachers, small classes (no more than 20 children), and small staff.–child ratios (less

than 1:10) produce strong short- and long-term educational gains. Programmes with fewer

resources invested in pre-primary classrooms often have failed to achieve similar results (Barnett,

2008:19). The effectiveness of ESD in ECCE is therefore critically dependent upon the quality and

quantity of training that is provided to its teachers. As UNESCO (2013) suggests, ESD should be

further integrated into teacher education to foster quality education and ESD. In order for teachers

to effectively teach ESD, they need to understand the multi-dimensional character of local and

global SD and to learn the basic methods for teaching ESD, as well as for evaluating, prioritising and

deciding on SD issues.

While the contribution of ECCE towards broader social, economic and education goals is increasingly

being recognised (OECD, 2009) the sector remains under-developed in a number of countries (gaps

in provision and inadequate quality in services), due in part to a lack of investment, as well as the

diversity of bodies and actors involved in its organisation and provision that may not be well

coordinated and/or regulated. For example, the OECD Starting Strong II report states that: ‘in many

OECD countries, the level of regulation of services for children under 3 gives rise for concern: much

of the ECCE sector is private and unregulated, with staff training and pedagogical programming

being particularly weak (Wagner, et al 2012).

The International Labour Organisation (2013) states that High-quality ECCE provision is dependent

on adequate investments in initial teacher education and training that ensure preparation for all

educators comparable to that of primary school teachers with equivalent professional status and

responsibilities. Initial education should therefore be based on the highest qualification levels in

relation to the established curricula and methods, at a minimum first level tertiary degree according

to national standards (from two years post-secondary to tertiary Bachelors level or equivalent) and

where human and financial resources permit on a progressive basis, at graduate or Master’s degree

level. Initial education should prepare educators with the necessary professional knowledge and

skills to respond to the learning needs and challenges of all children initial education and training.

Fully qualified teachers or educators should be required to have the same training and qualifications

as primary school teachers. ECE support pedagogues and teaching assistants should have the

qualifications equal to paraprofessional teaching support staff in basic education (Wallet, 2008).

The International Labour Organization (2013), argue for a social dialogue to determining access and

quality for all learners; initial training and professional development of educators, but also about

policy and working conditions for staff in ECCE. Since ECCE is an investment for the future, and ESD

in ECCE even more so, educators must have good training and good working conditions. Strong

leadership is important, and a need for more comprehensive research and data, particularly

concerning educators and other staff, to more effectively develop, apply, evaluate and reform ECCE

policy and practice. As we have seen, the initial training must also be improved to provide an

appropriate pedagogy, and this demands an adequate financial investment. The training and support

of teachers needs especially to be improved in disadvantaged areas, where these teachers are

needed the most.

We are aware of no recent systematic research that has been conducted to evaluate the quality or

provisions of teacher education for ECCE around the world. The qualifications that are required to

work in the sector vary widely from basic high school certification to undergraduate degree level. If

we consider two of the most developed models:

According to Presthus Heggen (2013) in Norway pre-school teacher training is regulated by national

frameworks although these do not specifically mention ESD, sustainable development or any related

terms. However, the courses also follow the regulations of the pre-schools, as found in the

kindergarten act which states, for example:

“Care, upbringing and learning in kindergartens shall promote human dignity, equality, intellectual

freedom, tolerance, health and an appreciation of sustainable development.” (Norwegian

Kindergarten Act, Section 2, Content of kindergartens)

This is further specified in the general part of the framework plan for kindergartens:

“It is important to instil a sense of responsibility for managing the natural and cultural heritage, and

of responsibility for people’s lives and health, in kindergartens. An understanding of sustainable

development shall be promoted in everyday life. Respect for life is fundamental.” (Ministry of

Education and Research 2006)

The kindergarten framework also specifies 7 learning areas, with ‘Nature, environment and

technology’ being one of these. The pre-schools should furthermore “promote an understanding of

sustainable development through words and actions, and select literature and activities that

promote such an understanding” (Ministry of Education and Research, 2006)

“Generally, work with ecological sustainability in young children in Norway has been based on the

notion that we should teach children to love nature and that they will then protect what they love”

(Presthus Hegen, 2013).

Developments have also been notable in Korea:

“Although at the national level the curriculum for Education for Sustainable Development is not yet

developed, pre-service and in-service teacher education, researches and practices have been

actively conducted. “ (Park, 2013)

Park (2013) reports that the Korea National Commission for UNESCO has provided support to build

networks within organizations certified as Korean UNESCO ESD Official Projects. In the first half of

2011, the project ‘Keeper of the Green Earth’ of Ewha Institute of Childhood Education and Care was

certified as Korea UNESCO ESD Official Project, followed by ‘Duksung Project: Saver of the

environment in earth’ of Duksung Women’s University Kindergarten and ‘Chungbuk Nature Loving

Association of early childhood education.’ ESD in early childhood teacher education has been

implemented in Ewha Institute of Childhood Education and Care attached to Ewha Womans

University, in the Myongji Kindergarten attached to Myongji College, and Duksung Kindergarten

attached to Duksung Women’s University.

The results from the second DESD survey of Member States, Key Stakeholders and UN Agencies

carried out by UNESCO (2014) suggests that ESD has been integrated into 52% of national policy

documents, and while we are aware of no comprehensive international data on the subject of ESD in

teacher education, the responses from our expert informants would suggest that the number of

counties that have implemented these changes at the level of ECCE or ECCE teacher education at

this time is significantly lower.

ESD research and innovation is being carried out in universities and colleges providing ECCE initial

teacher education around the world. The regional consultations identified a number of issues of

relevance to ECCE:

A post-2014 ESD programme framework should strengthen research on ESD topics and

innovation capacities of ESD practitioners and higher education institutions. This was a key

concern highlighted by participants (Yao et al, 2014 p 6)

ESD should be used as a tool and means to strengthen democracy, security as well as peace

and intercultural understanding in the African region.

(Yao et al, 2014 p5)

The need to prioritise initial teacher training and professional development was identified in many of

the sub-regional consultations and the core message of the 2012 International Labour Organization

report for discussion at the Global Dialogue Forum on Conditions of Personnel in Early Childhood

Education were that ECCE:

is a key investment for all countries,

requires greater policy, funding and organizational attention to reach maximum access for

young learners and their families, and;

that staff competencies and conditions are central to high quality provisions.

While many European countries have moved towards the adoption of equal standards and status for

the training and qualification of primary and pre-primary teachers, the qualifications and training of

ECCE educators continues to vary a great deal around the world. The standards are often very low in

in middle- and low-income countries and the combination of pre-primary teachers ‘employed on a

contract basis, receiving a low salary and with limited or no professional training has been cited as a

major impediment to quality ECCE in African countries (UNESCO.–BREDA, 2010: p44.–45).

5.4. Networks, Partnership and Outreach UNESCO reviews of the National ESD experiences from Costa Rica, Morocco, South Africa, Sweden

and Viet Nam (UNESCO 2013), among others, suggest that; political support from the national

government is vital for driving ESD processes. Having an institutional and legal framework and a

national strategy to implement ESD is also necessary for an efficient implementation of ESD at the

country level; A central coordinating body that can ensure the collaboration of all stakeholders and

oversee a coherent ESD strategy is important for effective ESD implementation.

ESD is a multi-stakeholder endeavour and participatory approaches to ESD are also important.

Approaches that include pre-primary teachers, teacher trainers, health workers and various other

stakeholders including researchers ranging from the smallest communities up to the national level

have proven to be successful. Effective bottom-up approaches can encourage governments to

upscale and increased research, monitoring and evaluation of ESD helps drive ESD progress on the

national level.

Expert participants in the Africa Regional Consultation also emphasized the need to sensitise

companies and organizations further towards Corporate Sustainability Responsibility and Practices.

The private sector should become more engaged; e.g. through creating Public Private Partnerships

for sustainable development (Yao, 2014, p6). As we have seen there are already examples, such as

the ‘Leuchtpol’ project that have shown such success in ECCE. Engaging with media as agents for

ESD and sustainability was also noted as a priority area to focus on after 2014. It was suggested that

all forms of media, including community radios that promote local cultures and languages as well as

social media and mobile phones should be used. (Yao, 2014, p6)

6. Analysis of Findings In a recent UNESCO (2013) survey conducted for this review of UN Decade of Education for

Sustainable Development, the Ministries of Education, Environment and Sustainable Development in

97 UN Member States identified Poverty as the highest priority area to be addressed in achieving

Sustainable Development. It is notable that this priority was rated above Climate Change and

Agricultural and Food Security. When asked about the priorities for specific educational responses to

achieving sustainable development, the Ministries also rated Early Childhood Care and Education

(ECCE) and Teacher Education above other areas of concern such as Public Awareness and Higher

Education.

Where ECCE provisions are inadequate or non-existent, any discussion of ESD in ECCE is purely

academic. ESD requires greater investment in ECCE, and it requires governments around the world

to adopt more holistic, ‘joined up thinking’ with regard to ECCE and ESD and its relevance to

children’s learning and development from birth.

Teacher education and training towards skills development on learning for sustainable development

and for behaviour change should be strengthened in a post-2014 ESD programme framework. There

are some excellent examples of ESD practice being developed around the world, but these need to

be disseminated more effectively and employed more systematically to provide an ESD initial and in-

service training for teachers. This must include ESD pedagogies that promote participation, values,

democratic decision-making skills and collaborative action oriented learning. (Yao et al, 2014 p5)

The Asia-Pacific Regional Consultation stressed the importance of striving toward a more equal

balance among the dimensions of ESD in the post-2014 framework while simultaneously promoting

a more comprehensive understanding of the interconnected, holistic, and integrated nature of ESD

(Shaeffer, 2013, p6). The participants identified and prioritised:

Early Childhood Care and Education

Teacher education

ESD research, monitoring and evaluation (UNESCO 2013a p4)

The insertion of ESD principles and practices throughout pre-service teacher education

The development and disseminating examples of good ESD curricula, teacher manuals, and

learning materials/activities at the classroom level

(Shaeffer, 2013, p5/6)

6.1. Potential for Scaling up ESD in ECCE Projects UNESCO (2012) Identified the following conditions for successful replication of the Raglan

Integrated Children Centre:

“The success of the programme is greatly dependent on motivated and creative centre staff who are

passionate about the development of functional socio-environmental safety nets and early

childhood learners. There is also an underlying need for a diverse set of skills within the centre staff

to meet the needs of the diverse skills development approaches”.

Other initiatives identified in this report with clear potential for up-scaling include:

Wash from the Start

The development of more pre-primary/community project partnerships

Projects involving corporate co-funding

Efforts by international associations such as OMEP and the Green schools initiatives

There are many small scale projects to build upon, and there is a need for policy to ‘catch up’ and to

provide additional support to the ECCE pioneers who are working to create these exemplary projects

in the field. The key stakeholder responses to the second DESD survey of Member States, Key

Stakeholders and UN Agencies carried out by UNESCO (2014) are significant in this respect, and

show a global pattern. In reporting on the ‘greatest achievements’ being made in ESD only 12%

referred to the ‘integration of ESD into policy and curriculum’, while 58% referred to ‘projects and

results’.

The DESD Regional consultation also noted that a lot still needs to be done in Africa to improve the

quality of education and enable learners to contribute to shaping sustainable development: (Yao et

al, 2014, p6)

A number of key factors needed for successful scaling up identified in the Asia-Pacific Regional

Consultation and they all apply equally to ECCE initiatives. These included:

strong partners for ESD (from government, the private sector, NGOs, and academics) and

strong collaboration among them

political support and commitment at a high level (e.g., president or prime minister)

a comprehensive, national sustainable development Action Plan that includes ESD as one of

its major components

the demonstration of linkages between ESD and a nation’s international obligations and

agreements

incentives for good practice (e.g., awards, recognition, financial)

strong and visible media support (e.g., newspaper/TV reports of sustainable development

challenges and of good ESD practices)

a sharper focus on local issues and situations

monitoring and assessment mechanisms and indicators that can provide evidence of positive

results

the systematic inclusion/integration of ESD concepts into the core curricula of both teacher

education institutions and classrooms

capacity building of all stakeholders toward understanding, programming for, implementing,

and assessing ESD activities

(Shaeffer, 2013, P4/5)

6.2. Challenges and Lessons Learned The promotion of a comprehensive understanding of and consensus around the nature of ESD and

ECCE remains a challenge especially for key decision-makers and politicians.

UNICEF Multiple Indicator Cluster Surveys suggests that, in 100 low and middle income Countries:

“overall, young children in the countries surveyed live in households that are not conducive to

optimal early childhood development” (UNICEF, 2012):

More than half of children lack the stimulation provided by books in the home in about two

thirds of countries.

More than half of children are denied adequate support for early learning in about a third of

countries.

Attendance in such programmes is 10 per cent or less in a third of countries.

More than half of children 2–4 years old are subjected to violent forms of discipline in nearly

all of the countries surveyed.

At least one in six young children receive inadequate care in more than a third of countries.

At least one in four children live without their biological fathers in about a third of countries

surveyed.

(op cit)

Again the Asia-Pacific Regional Consultation provided a useful list that is as relevant to ECCE as to

other areas of education:

The framing ESD in terms of specific targets, with benchmarks for learning achievement

outcomes, which leaders can understand (e.g., at regional ministerial meetings and internal,

inter-ministerial coordination meetings)

The need to ensure that essential concepts of ESD are integrated into the core curriculum of

learners and teachers

The need to use more systematic research and innovation in ESD to develop and then prove

the effectiveness of “good practices”

The dissemination and adaptation of such practices to other nations, systems, and schools

(Shaeffer, 2013, P9/10)

6.3. Policy level/programme implementation With regard to policy and programme implementation the need to particularly address the following

challenges in a post-2014 ESD programme framework also highlighted the following which may be

considered especially relevant to ESD in ECCE:

Insufficient integration of ESD in national development policies and sectorial plans

(education, health, agriculture etc.) at national and regional levels;

Lack of awareness and awareness raising on ESD by different stakeholders;

Poor inter-ministerial cooperation and coordination between different stakeholders on ESD

implementation as well as insufficient use of synergies;

Inadequate mobilisation of resources to support ESD implementation.

(Yao, et al.,2014)

Lack of capacity was noted as a challenge for implementing ESD, namely:

Inadequate capacity of teachers to implement ESD programmes;

Inadequate learning materials to support ESD implementation;

Under-utilisation of sustainable indigenous knowledge, values and practices;

Under-utilisation of sustainable faith–based knowledge values and practices.

(Yao, et al., 2014)

6.4. Suggestions for Further Action

ESD in ECCE Recommendations

A redefinition of Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE)

Fragmentation has been identified as a major barrier to effective implementation of practice in

ECCE, ESD and lifelong learning (UNESCO, 2011, p 17). ECCE needs to be clearly defined by policy

makers in terms of ESD to include provisions to ensure child safety, nutrition, hygiene, attachment,

stimulation, and communicative interaction from birth to starting school. As ECCE is foundational for

lifelong learning, there is an urgent need for capacity building within practitioners and other

members of society to form strong safety nets and communities for young children, including

strengthening the capabilities of parents and other primary caregivers in a tradition that embraces

sustainability. The International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED, 2011) level 0 has been

revised, to provide support for these more holistic developments and in recognition of the

importance of early childhood learning and development from birth.

Wash in Schools

The aim of Millennium Development target 10 has been to cut in half, by 2015, the proportion of

people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation. In many contexts this

will not be achieved yet we require more ambitious targets for the future and it is widely recognised

that education provides a crucial component in meeting these challenges. Pre-primary sector has an

important role to play in this and there is therefore a need to provide greater support and expansion

of the WASH in Schools initiative and for all pre-primary institutions to be provided with the support

they require to provide safe drinking water, sanitation and hygiene education to the children in their

care.

Violence

In nearly all the countries included in a recent UNICEF (2012) report, more than half of the children

aged 2-4 years old were found to be subjected to violent forms of discipline. Continued violence is

widely recognized as one of the most significant threats to sustainability, and this has to be stopped.

The UN lunched a consortium for Peace education network in 2013, and we recommend that as

peace and non-violence are an important aspect of ESD this network should become more closely

associated with ESD.

Universal access to ECCE

The reduction of poverty and inequity is recognised as the foremost priority in our efforts to create a

more sustainable world. There is a need to ensure that all children are cared for from birth, and that

all children should have access to pre-primary educational support from 3 years of age. One

particular aspect of inequity that is currently widely recognized as a major problem is the shortage of

books for young children. Story books provide important foundations for the children’s emergent

literacy development. We therefore recommend the commissioning of a high quality series of ECCE

children’s books to be produced for global multi-lingual application that can foster both literacy skills

and an early understandings of ESD.

The Rights and Responsibilities of Young Children

The presence and activities of young children have an influence on the adults around them.

Following the UN Universal Declaration on the Rights of the Child, the citizenship of children of all

ages should be recognised as well as their rights and responsibilities as agents for change. Children

often influence their families in adopting more sustainable thinking and behaviours and in pre-

primary education a curriculum focus on sustainable consumption is therefore appropriate. Young

children are involved in many day-to-day practices that are considered significant to achieving

sustainable development. This recognition of children’s rights and responsibilities includes an

awareness of, and concern for:

the negative influences of commercial advertising upon children;

the direct economic influence that children have as consumers;

young children’s influence on wider patterns of family consumption; and

the need to create community ‘cultures of sustainability’, around ECCE settings)

Quality Provisions for ECCE

We know that it is not enough to provide access to pre-primary education, it is the quality of that

provision that makes the different for children, and most significantly that is in the pedagogy that is

applied. ECCE programs should therefore include ESD curriculum content, but they must also: build

upon the everyday experience of children; provide curriculum integration and creativity;

intergenerational problem solving and solution seeking; the promotion of intercultural

understanding and recognition of interdependency; involvement of the wider community; and

active citizenship in the early years; The creation of cultures of sustainability.

The Initial Education and Training of ECCE Professionals

ESD and ECCE should be integrated in pre-service and in-service health, community support and

teacher education at all levels with explicit reference made to the need to develop greater global

awareness, child resilience and disaster risk reduction (DRR), alongside more traditional sustainable

development concerns such as sustainable consumption, recycling, energy efficiency etc.). Regional

studies would seek to identify vulnerability to present and future hazards and national or regional

guidelines or curricula for the teacher to use as a guide. Some excellent projects that have included

in-service training for teachers have been developed with Corporate sponsorship. Such projects

should be encouraged further with national and international agencies offering matched funding

grants.

ECCE Sustainable Development Goal

The findings of this review strongly support the perspective adopted by Aber, Lombardi, Klaus and

Campion (2013) in their proposal for a new global development goal for the post-2015 agenda.

While we consider that the specific targets that they suggest in their proposal could be more

ambitious, as an urgent short-term global goal the United Nations should certainly:

“Reduce by half the number of children under 5 who fail to reach their developmental potential”

(Aber et al, 2013).

Delegated funding for ESD in ECCE funding

There remains much work to be done in terms of training and in the encouragement of innovation in

the area of ESD in ECCE. In the short and medium term there is therefore a need to increase targeted

funding. There is a need to embed ESD practices in all ECCE activities and, to this end, we

recommend that every budget associated with ECCE should have an audited ESD component. Every

receiving agency or institution would then be accountable to a national or regional authority with

overall responsibility for supporting ESD . It is essential that such a national authority should have an

overview and responsibility that lies outside and across traditional disciplines and ECCE sectors, and

that it encourages the development of successful and long lasting multi- and transdisciplinary ESD

practices. As an emerging field of practice, ESD in ECCE is currently seriously under-researched and

under evaluated. This must be remedied in order to build the field on an evidence-base of critique,

reflection and creativity. There is also a need to provide greater research mentoring and capacity

building. While important everywhere, this is especially important in poorer countries where

significant portions of research are still conducted by researchers who have no experience in

teaching ECE in the sector. Every budget associated with ESD in ECCE should therefore be awarded

with a research component, this could also be administered by the national authority with overall

responsibility for ESD.

7. Conclusion As the second DESD survey of Member States, Key Stakeholders and UN Agencies carried out by

UNESCO (2014, p55) suggests, as the Decade comes to an end, hundreds of thousands of ESD

practitioners and concerned actors will be celebrating its many achievements and many ECCE

specialists will be among these. But:

“As the DESD reaches its end there is need for more effective monitoring and evaluation, for scaling

up good practices to guide policy and for developing effective policies to boost action.”(op cit, p56)

From a global perspective it is important to recognize that responses and priorities related to

‘survival’ and ‘sustainability’ often look quite different in different national and regional contexts. In

many relatively wealthy national contexts the priority may be to encourage greater respect for finite

resources, and an understanding of global interdependence. In many poorer world contexts, the

highest priorities are sometimes to provide the most basic care for children and to improve literacy.

While in the former relatively wealthy national contexts ‘survival’ is often seen as a medium, or even

as a long-term abstract threat, for too many in the majority world the brutal realities of the struggle

for survival are all too apparent on a daily basis. What all of the varied ‘sustainable’ projects that we

engage in have in common is our common concern to educate children for a sustainable future. The

practices themselves may seem very different, but this is only apparent if we ignore our global

interdependence. What is emerging within ECCE is therefore a series of initiatives targeted at

different aspects of ESD:

Support for children who are failing to achieve their potential right now due to ill health,

nutrition and access to ECCE services.

Preparation of children for future emergencies - Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR)

Mainstream pre-primary curriculum practice in Education for Sustainable Development

(Recycling, saving electricity etc)

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