the framework
This research-based framework highlights 7 essential components of a pedagogy of environmental hope using the acronym H.O.P.E.F.U.L. Each element of the model is interconnected, allowing for a holistic application of the model.
environmental hope
H: Hands-on
A hopeful environmental classroom prioritizes embodied action outdoors that engages students in using their hands and bodies. This allows learners to develop a whole body connection to the environment, become more in-tune with their emotions, develop their inner awareness and connect from within to without. This approach flips the popular ‘Head-Heart-Hands’ approach to learning in reverse, to start with Hands-on action, then allow the Heart to tune-in and finally engage the Head to be more intrinsically connected to the scientific aspects of climate change.
O: Outcomes-based
A hopeful environmental classroom continually provides students with the opportunity to see the fruits of their labour through a solutions-oriented approach. Although large-scale social-environmental change doesn’t happen overnight, when students can link their learning directly to doable solutions and positive outcomes, they begin to live and act through a hopeful and empowered mindset.
P: Possibility
A hopeful approach to climate change education is centered around belief in possibility. By regularly engaging students in imagining what might be possible, students can harness their innate power of imagination and creativity to see beyond the boundaries of their current context and believe in alternative ways of living, knowing and being. A pedagogy of possibility encourages learners to dream, and empowers them to value their imagination as a powerful form of knowledge and innovation. It also teaches them that even if the possibility of their vision is 1%, it is still essentially possible and thus worthy of exploring. What seems impossible at one point in time, can become a common sense solution after it is created.
E: Everyone
A hopeful environmental mindset is only built when students embody that change happens through collective social action. Building community through collaboration with various members of society builds trust in young people that they are not alone. Engaging inter-generational partnerships, learning from elders, valuing different types of knowledge, developing listening skills, identifying trusting adults and even learning to work with non-human beings can all develop a deep sense of community and trust within students. This in turn builds a hopeful, collective and empowered approach to change that embraces togetherness, and resists the individualistic paradigm of the ‘eco-hero’.
F: Future-oriented
A pedagogy of environmental hope looks ahead to the future of planet earth. While learning from the past and learning about the science of climate change is important, a hopeful mindset is one that leans towards the future and continually orientates learners towards looking ahead. It puts the quality of life of future generations the top of mind and prioritizes their dreams and rights for their future.
U: Unlearn
A pedagogy of environmental hope takes a critical stance, where educators and students engage actively in unlearning common misconceptions about social-environmental change. Such misconceptions and unlearning involve:
- Emotions are useless in learning about climate change and should not have a place in the curriculum: Emotions are in fact powerful forms of knowledge and learning. By paying attention to the emotions underlying the words and actions of others–adults, students, the media and society-at-large–we can learn to understand hidden messages, biases and then resist them. Legitimizing emotions can allow students to build greater inner awareness, empowerment and hope.
- Hope is all about positivity and wishing for the best: A critical pedagogy of hope is not passive. It is about understanding that by engaging in collective action, change is possible. It seeks to continually engage in the tough conversations and sit in discomfort when needed. It is a mindset and paradigm shift that educators can develop daily and gradually in their classroom culture. By teaching lessons through all the elements of the framework on a regular basis, educators and students will develop hope through their ability to grow and take action on challenging issues.
- Climate change is only a scientific issue: A pedagogy of hope looks at emotions, power and privilege, and social injustice as key factors in climate issues. It aims to change the dominant narrative, raise oppressed voices and decolonize the environment. Hope is brought forth when the social and environmental are understood as interwoven and when students feel empowered to work in harmony with both of these aspects of their lives.
- ‘One person can make a difference’: This common expression, while it has good intentions, can often leave students feeling overwhelmed. Climate issues can feel daunting and students don’t always believe that ‘one person can make a difference’. While the statement has truth and merit to it, a hopeful pedagogy focuses more on ‘people working together can make a difference’. A critically hopeful pedagogy highlights collective action, community and citizenship education.
L: Land-based
Land-based education is a decolonizing approach to environmental education. A critically hopeful pedagogy must integrate decolonial ways of knowing and living. Ongoing learning with and from Indigenous community members is necessary to build empowered and hopeful environmental learners, who will create change through a decolonial lens. Land-based approaches centre the work of decolonizing the environment as necessary to building a hopeful, sustainable future.