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Makale Özeti:
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In the general activity of daily life, it is easy to miss our dependency on the Earth’s
ecology. At the same time that people are living apparently separate from the
environment, our impact on the Earth is increasing. This study seeks to understand how
teachers can bridge this persistent disconnect of daily life from ecology and human
impact. Specifically, this study addresses teachers’ use of a conceptual model for
teaching ecology and human impact units that link daily life, human impact and
ecological function. Thirty-six ninth grade biology teachers implemented curriculum
that was grounded in an explicit conceptual model for teaching the relationship between
ecological function, human impact, and daily life. Pre and post implementation, teachers
completed detailed descriptions of their lesson plans for teaching ecology and human
impact topics. Content analysis of teacher lesson plan descriptions shows that teachers
have a greater difficulty integrating daily life and human impact into ecological topics
than they do in integrating daily life and ecology into human impact topics. This study
also documented the difficulty of applying a conceptual model that overtly connects
daily life and human impact to ecological function. Despite this, the implementation of
curriculum grounded in an explicit conceptual model for linking daily life, human
environmental impact and ecology helped teachers articulate those connections in ways
that could enable students to understand the unintended consequences of daily life
activities on specific ecological function.
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