ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses how creative geography teaching can help children understand and engage with sustainability issues and be genuinely involved in designing outcomes with future well-being in mind. Young children have a good deal of curiosity about the world that they live in but they also worry about the future of the planet. When they are given opportunities to participate in relevant creative and critical problem-solving enquiries, their learning can become powerful. Such teaching helps children to be better informed and thus more able to tackle issues such as climate change, unequal development and loss of biodiversity, which may otherwise seem daunting. It also provides an agenda of hope.
‘Education for sustainability’ (ESD) is a term used to describe an approach to education that considers how we might better look after the planet we have inherited for the benefit of present and future generations. It has a wide remit and takes into account ideas such as stewardship, justice, equity and human rights. Although there are many definitions of ESD, they all involve focus on the future and how we might change it through our actions to offer a preferable quality of life for everyone. Thinking about how we might be best equipped to make decisions that will impact on our own and others’ everyday lives, and the environments that sustain us, are powerful and relevant ideas for education, requiring both creative and critical thought. Owens (2011: 8) raises the following questions:
