Reading Nature- experienced teachers’ reflections on a teaching sequence in ecology: implications for future teacher training

Abstract

This article explores experienced primary teachers views on teaching for ‘reading nature’. The concept ‘reading nature’ has to do with an ability to recognise organisms and relate them to material cycling and energy flow in the specific habitat which is to be read. It has to do with the natural world that we face outside and the tools we have are our experiences from previous learning situations both in and out-of-doors. The teachers were asked to comment on the content of a CD-ROM with teaching sequences from a primary class studying a river ecosystem. Perceptions that teachers held were found to be supportive but complex and varied regarding the possibilities and advantages of implementing this type of teaching design in the everyday classroom. The paper finishes by identifying some implications for teacher training to support fieldwork and ecological literacy in primary schools in the future.