Using Environment-Based Education to Advance Learning Skills and Character Development

NEETF. (1997).
The 1997 NEETF/Roper National Report Card.
Washington, DC:The
National Environmental Education & Training Foundation. http://www.neetf.org/
reportcard/index.htm.
A survey of Americans attitudes and knowledge about the environment, its condition 
and problems.
O’Neil, J. and C. Tell. (1999, September).Why Students Lose When “Tougher
Standards” Win.
Educational Leadership
, 57(1), 18-23.
Suggests that the tougher standards movement may be incompatible with personalized learn-
ing and counterproductive to student achievement. Recommends that students be given more
academic freedom to encourage their development as lifelong learners and engaged citizens.
Rainer, J. D. and E. M. Guyton. (1999). Democratic Practices in Teacher Education and
the Elementary Classroom.
Teaching and Teacher Education
, 15(1), 121-32.
Teachers perceive that encouraging students to make choices about their learning exerts a
positive influence on their attitudes about school and learning.

---

Rasmussen, K. (2000, January). Environmental Education Evolves: Developing Citizens,
Furthering Education Reform.
ASCD Education Update
42:1.
Interviews with leaders in the EE field. Positions EE as a means of promoting citizenship and
of meeting students’ academic needs.
Richetti, C. and J. Sheerin. (1999, November). Helping Students Ask the Right
Questions.
Educational Leadership
, 57(3), 58-62.
http://www.ascd.org/publs/el/nov99.html.
Underlying constru c t ivism is the re c ognition of the value of the learner as thinke r. The ability
to think, the authors say, is related to the ability to generate and consider important questions.