Left: Student from Raffles Institution discovers a new marine species on Punggol Beach during the 2007 International Coastal Cleanup. Right: Children playing a memory game that teaches them about bat diversity in Singapore.
Moving Toward Sustainability? The face of environmental education in Singapore
by Bryan Wee S
INGAPORE IS A NATION STATE that gained inde- pendence from British colonial rule in the 1960s. Over the years, its strategic location along sea–air routes
quickly elevated its status as a trading hub in Southeast Asia and attracted many immigrants from the Malay Peninsula, China and the Indian subcontinent. Today, Singapore’s burgeoning population of 4.3 million thrives on an island no larger than some metropolitan areas in the United States (Singapore measures 690 square kilometers, or 266 square miles). The population is largely composed of Chinese, Indi- ans and Malays. To keep pace with population growth, the Singapore government has implemented intensive land-use schemes to increase the built-up area and to improve infra- structure, thus creating a highly industrialized and efficient but densely populated country.1
hold an environmental worldview that emphasizes human development over resource conservation. Wee et al. found that children in Singapore tended to incorporate humans or elements of human intervention, such as buildings, into their conceptions of the environment and often assigned to natural resources a “value” from utilitarian perspectives.2
In
other words, the children valued land primarily because it met human needs and they emphasized the use, rather than conservation of, natural resources. Indeed, children were quick to defend development that would provide economic gain, recreational opportunities and aesthetic enjoyment. Previous research described similar trends in Singaporeans’ environmental knowledge, attitudes and behaviors. Savage and Lau found that high school students in Singapore had low levels of environmental awareness and demonstrated little commitment to proactive environmental actions.3
Tan This, however, has also led to
the rapid reduction of natural areas in Singapore, so that now only remnants of rainforests, wetlands or mangroves remain. Given this history of land-use change and the resulting landscape, it is not entirely surprising that Singaporeans
et al. discovered that while some high school students did possess a relatively high level of environmental knowledge, it consisted of “learned responses” and did not accurately represent students’ concern for the environment.4
In fact,
less than half the students in that study engaged in environ- mental behaviors. Likewise, Kong et al. stated, on the basis
Global Green Teaching: Spotlight on Singapore GREEN TEACHER 83
Page 35
Photo, left: Raffles Institution. Right: Chan Kwok Wai
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56
