*Article* **More Than Two Decades of Research on Selective Traditions in Environmental and Sustainability Education—Seven Functions of the Concept**

**Per J. Sund 1,2,\* and Niklas Gericke <sup>2</sup>**


**Abstract:** This study investigates functions of the concept of selective traditions by means of a qualitative systematic review synthesis of earlier research. The study is based on a review method for integrating qualitative studies and looks for "themes" in or across them. In this case, it is about how the identified publications (twenty-four in total) use the concept of selective traditions. All but two studies stem from the Swedish context. The selective traditions relate to teachers' approaches to the content, methods and purposes of environmental and sustainability education (ESE). Teachers mainly work within one specific selective tradition. Seven different functions were found in the publications of which five are claimed to be valuable for the development of ESE teaching, while the other two functions are useful in monitoring changes and development in ESE teaching. The results are discussed in terms of the consequences for research, practice and teacher education aiming at offering suggestions on how to develop future (transformative) ESE teaching.

**Keywords:** selective traditions; teaching traditions; teaching habits; environmental and sustainability education; functions of teaching; functions of education; ESD teaching approaches

#### **1. Introduction**

This study investigates functions of the concept of selective traditions by means of a qualitative systematic review synthesis of earlier research. The study is based on a review method for integrating studies and looks for "themes" in or across them [1]. In this case, it is about how studies use the concept of selective traditions as described by different functions. Selective traditions relate to teachers' approaches to the content, methods and purposes of environmental and sustainability education (ESE). Three teaching traditions of ESE have been identified in previous research: the fact-based tradition of conveying facts, the normative tradition that argues for certain values and lifestyles and the pluralist tradition that focuses on students' participation and emancipation. Teachers mainly work within one specific tradition. However, the traditions are not usually recognized by the teachers themselves, but by researchers using analytical tools. In this study, we identified the specific functions these three selective traditions had been reported to have in previous studies both from an educational and research perspective. The results are discussed in terms of the consequences for research and practice aiming at a systematic development of informed future ESE teaching.

#### **2. Background**

Research on the teachers teaching different school subjects has shown that they all have different ways, or traditions, of selecting educational content and methods. These traditions can thus be termed selective traditions [2]. Selective traditions can be understood as what teachers consider good teaching. The concept of selective traditions is useful when

**Citation:** Sund, P.J.; Gericke, N. More Than Two Decades of Research on Selective Traditions in Environmental and Sustainability Education—Seven Functions of the Concept. *Sustainability* **2021**, *13*, 6524. https:// doi.org/10.3390/su13126524

Academic Editor: Enrique-Javier Díez-Gutiérrez

Received: 7 May 2021 Accepted: 2 June 2021 Published: 8 June 2021

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**Copyright:** © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/).

discussing environmental and sustainability education (ESE) with teachers in that it is a way of expressing their ambitions to change and develop teaching in a reflected and informed way [3]. The selective teaching traditions of ESE are useful for understanding the role of teachers, students and the purpose of education [4] because it focuses on teachers' responses to the question that is often posed by students, "Why should I learn this?" [5].

The implications for teacher education are also strong [6]. Often, teachers teach in the way they were taught at university; this needs to be recognized and addressed in teacher education so that student teachers are aware of how to change from disciplinary teaching of adults to teaching children and adolescents school subjects [7]. Student teachers need support from teacher educators to change from the focus on disciplinary facts and concepts to also emphasize the importance of students' interests and participation. There is a shift from disciplinary knowledge to everyday knowledge that teacher education needs to pay attention to, and in this, the concept of selective traditions is a useful tool [8].

In the Swedish context, selective traditions have been investigated for more than two decades in science education and environmental and sustainability education research. The most important finding has been the identification of three teaching traditions within environmental and sustainability education: the fact-based tradition, the normative tradition and the pluralistic tradition. These traditions have provided research and practice with an analytical tool that can be used to discuss the role and purpose of education [9] and the students' democratic participation in it [10]. In the following section, we discern these traditions in more detail.

#### *2.1. Three Selective Traditions in ESE*

Three selective traditions have been identified in environmental education (EE) in Sweden since the 1960s, with reference to educational philosophy and how environmental and developmental problems are understood by teachers [9]. Sandell, Öhman and Östman [9] described three educational philosophies connected to selective teaching traditions: essentialism, progressivism and reconstructivism. The starting points in these three educational philosophies also indicate three different solutions to environmental problems: to the lack of relevant scientific knowledge (facts), to weakly developed attitudes and un-reflected lifestyles (unclear norms) or in the form of informed attempts to solve conflicting human interests (pluralism of solutions).

Selective traditions were studied for the first time in a large study of teachers (*n* = 568) in the Swedish school system by the Swedish National Agency for Education (2002). Teachers mainly work within one tradition. It is important to point out that the descriptions of these traditions (outlined below) were summarized in order to make them easier for the reader to grasp. The traditions are teachers' teaching types. The descriptions outlined below closely follow the original descriptions [3].

The fact-based tradition was formed in the early development of EE. Environmental issues are regarded mainly as ecological issues. Environmental problems are based on the lack of knowledge and can often be solved by science. There is an assumption that if teachers teach scientific knowledge at school, environmental problems will disappear more or less automatically. From the environmental ethics perspective, this tradition lies within modern anthropocentrism. The natural world is considered to be separate from humanity. In terms of educational philosophy, this tradition is closest to essentialism. Essentialism means that the content of education ought to be based on science, that the actual subject matter has priority and that the teaching uses adapted scientific terminology and models. The pedagogic task is to teach pupils the right knowledge and proper knowledge. The teaching style in this tradition is mainly through lectures, with very little group discussion or activities in which the learned knowledge can be applied. Teachers make the planning [9].

The normative tradition emerged during the societal debate in the 1980s, e.g., as a result of the nuclear power referendum in Sweden. Environmental issues are primarily a question of values, where people's lifestyles and their consequences become the main

threats to the natural world. Scientific knowledge can offer hints about the good ways of living and be prescriptive in decision-making. According to the teachers of this tradition, right knowledge is assumed to automatically lead to better values that make people want to change their lifestyle. From an ethical point of view, humans are regarded as an indispensable part of nature and should therefore adapt to its conditions; it is a biocentric view. The teaching content is partly organized in a thematic way and requires content from many disciplines. Attention is paid to the use of pupils' everyday experiences and attitudes when creating teaching examples and tasks [9]. The starting point in progressivism puts pupils in the central position, where the teaching is organized in accordance with the needs and interests of the group of pupils.

The pluralistic tradition developed during discussions in the 1990s. An increasing uncertainty about environmental issues and the number of different standpoints in environmental debates (e.g., Rio Summit 1992) are important points of departure for this tradition. Environmental issues are viewed as political problems and are regarded as conflicts between different human interests [10]. Science does not offer guidance on how to act when it comes to solving environmental issues. In this tradition, EE includes the entire spectrum of social and economic development and is replaced with the concept of ESD [11]. The conflict-based perspective of ESD highlights that everyone's view on environmental issues is regarded as being equally relevant. Pluralism is an important starting point for the conduct of teaching in ESD. Pupils develop their abilities to engage in the development of a sustainable society. This suggests that the lessons are reconstructivist in character. Recontructivism emphasizes the role of the school in the democratic development of a future sustainable society. Teaching methods and approaches vary from an individual search for more scientific facts to writing articles or formulating arguments that can be used and published in newspapers.

Other ways of describing selective traditions in other countries can be found as well. Sauvé [12] and Stables [13] described selective traditions in EE in the context of Canada and the UK. Sauvé's starting point is in the contemporary development of a societal environmental consciousness and discourse, while Stables starts by discussing the importance of enhancing nature relations. Vare and Scott [14] described two types of ESD in the UK that have some similarities with selective traditions: ESD 1 and ESD 2. ESD 1 facilitates a change in our ability to deal with the problems of the present and how we live now by promoting behavioral change, a shift in habits or a change in how things are thought about, where the need for this has been clearly identified and socially agreed on. ESD 2 facilitates a change in our ability to deal with an uncertain and unknown future by enabling pupils to think critically about (and beyond) what is known now and what experts say and to test sustainable development ideas [14].

#### *2.2. The Importance of Functions in the Research on Selective Traditions in ESE*

This is a review study on the use of the concept of selective traditions in ESE research. The qualitative differences in the use of the concept in different publications can be regarded as different themes, which in this article are called functions. These functions are developed across individual studies described in ESE research publications where the concept is used in a similar way.

This study was inspired by Biesta [15], who describes the purpose of education in terms of functions. A function is described by Biesta as an overarching purpose of education that reflects its aim. In the work by Biesta, he identifies three functions of education. The first function is that education has a role to play in pupils' socialization into the society by conveying social, political and cultural values and behavior that aim to preserve a specific democratic society. The second function is that education contributes to pupils' qualifications, thereby advancing their knowledge, skills and competences for their lives in various areas, such as the labor market (different professions), further studies and as citizens. The third function is that education has a role to play in pupils' subjectification. This is about the emancipation of pupils as humans and providing them with agency as citizens.

Biesta's [15] approach of using different functions to describe the purpose of education inspired this study to discern the functions the research of a specific concept, in this case, ESE selective traditions, has identified. These identified functions can be used as analytical tools, which can inform the analysis and development of future ESE teaching. This means that different functions of the concept of selective traditions can be used to understand how new and future ESE teaching can be better reflected upon and developed in research, practice and teacher education [16].

#### **3. Purpose**

The overall purpose of this study was to offer researchers and educators a qualitative systematic review of more than two decades of empirical research on selective traditions in environmental and sustainability education research. Here, the different ways of using the concept in research are referred to as functions. The purpose of the study was to investigate how the concept of selective traditions in ESE research had been assigned qualitatively different functions in earlier research. The study's research question is, "Which functions of the concept of selective traditions are discernible in earlier ESE research?"

#### **4. Method and Review Design**

For the study, a systematic review was used as method. Systematic reviews seek to draw together all known knowledge on a topic area. In this endeavor, study designs incorporating quantitative, qualitative and mixed method studies can be used [1]. In this study, we used qualitative analysis, but the included studies represent both quantitative and qualitative studies. In the analysis of the selected studies, we used thematic analysis looking for "themes" or "constructs" in and across the individual studies and determined their functions [1].

#### *4.1. Literature Search*

The review began with a systematic search of selected terms and term combinations in databases (ERIC, EBSCO) and Google Scholar [17]. The terms used in the search represented different combinations of the key terms: "habitual teaching" and "EE/ESD/ESE," "selective" and "EE/ESD/ESE," "selective traditions" and "EE/ESD/ESE," "teaching traditions" and "EE/ESD/ESE." All the studies identified from the search were included in the following analysis. The identified publications (twenty-two in total) were journal articles (fifteen), one doctoral thesis, two books, three book chapters and one national report. Twenty studies were conducted in Sweden, one—in the USA/Spain, one—in the Netherlands. Two manuscripts, one book chapter in progress and one article manuscript in review written by the authors of this literature review, were included. These twenty-four publications in total consisted of five theoretical papers and eighteen empirical studies using surveys, interviews (teacher/pupil), focus groups (teachers) and textbooks as primary data from secondary and upper secondary school. The twenty-four publications are listed in alphabetical order below:


#### *4.2. Analysis of the Publications*

As already indicated, the aim of a systematic review is to look for "themes" in and across individual studies to extrapolate new general meaning from the included studies [1]. The analytical question used to discern the crosscutting themes was, "How is the concept of selective traditions used in the actual publication?" The twenty-four identified publications were read several times and the focus of the analysis was to find crosscutting themes of what function the concept of selective traditions was given.

First, relevant information was extracted from each publication using a coding sheet. Coded information included both descriptive study characteristics and study findings as guided by the review question related to the function of the concept of selective traditions in the study. Tentative themes were identified to obtain the first, preliminary arrangement of the studies and their findings and to prepare for synthesis. Regardless of whether the information was quantitative or qualitative, all coding had to focus on the key concepts as well as concise summaries of the study findings [1]. In some publications, the concept of selective traditions was used in two different ways, but then the analysis focused on describing its main function. This was the way of making the results of the functions more succinct and useful for ESE researchers and approach developers.

Second, the data analysis stage of the synthesis work was done iteratively, by repeatedly and in a cyclical process considering tentative review findings in relation to individual study findings. The publications with similar answers to the analytical question together formed a specific function. Synthesis meetings were alternated with re-readings of the studies. The purpose of the meetings was to test and, if necessary, revise tentative review findings by creating additional abstractions or reformulations.

#### **5. Results**

Seven different functions were found in the publications analyzed in this ESE research review, of which five are regarded as valuable for the development of ESE research and practice. Two of the functions are interesting for research on changes in teaching emphasis and the distribution of teaching approaches. The functions are presented below but are not listed in any particular order.

#### *5.1. Combining Educational Philosophy and Environmental Problems in Teaching*

The first function of the concept of selective traditions in ESE is to combine starting points in educational philosophy with the characteristics of environmental and developmental problems. This function offers researchers and practitioners the possibility to reflect on the origins of educational philosophy and the purpose of ESE teaching, namely what is to be learned, how it should be learned and the nature of the sustainability challenges to be addressed. These are fundamental issues to consider when designing ESE teaching approaches.

Some of the reviewed publications [3,9] elaborated on how selective traditions evolved in environmental education in Sweden with reference to their roots in educational philosophy and how environmental and developmental problems are perceived by teachers. The analytical combination of roots in educational philosophy and how teachers perceive environmental problems resulted in the identification of the fact-based, normative and pluralistic selective traditions in EE [3,9]. The concept of selective traditions is a way of understanding how different ways of ESE teaching emphasize student participation, development of students' democratic (communicating, listening, arguing, debating) and critical abilities (analysis, critical approach, pluralism of alternatives) [11]. Similar selective traditions were described for science teaching [18], where socio-scientific issues (e.g., climate change, sustainability, water and food scarcity) were included [19].

#### *5.2. Analysing ESE Teaching Empirically*

The second function of the concept of selective traditions is about empirically analyzing teachers' teaching in order to discern which selective traditions are used. This function offers an analytical tool that helps researchers to empirically discern the selective traditions and transform them into a reflection tool for practitioners [8]. With the tool, teachers can individually reflect on their teaching in each educational aspect. Teacher groups can also reflect on their common teaching in extracurricular collaborations and whether they emphasize facts, values or the development of abilities [16]. The tool has also been used to discern the ESE teaching approaches of social science and language teachers [8].

Sund [20] showed in a previous literature review how EE historically developed into ESD in the Swedish context. This earlier review generated five educational aspects (see Figure 1) that show the movement of teachers' educational content from focusing solely on the conveying of facts towards a more pluralistic teaching. The figure shows how the five educational aspects were developed into an analytical tool that included five analytical questions for analyzing teachers' responses in interviews about their ESE teaching. The teachers' responses made three selective traditions visible [21].

**Figure 1.** The educational content of each selective tradition is 'opened up' through five important *educational aspects*, each of which answers one question. The subject-matter content is consisting of ecological, economical (EC) and social issues (Soc).

Figure 1 shows in a model that the educational content connects more with the surrounding world, outside school, the further it is positioned from the center. This model can be used to analyze ESE teaching empirically. Teachers could themselves, or by others, be positioned in five educational aspects through different accounts of their EE/ESE teaching. The integrated subject matter is placed in the inner circle (shown in bold letters). This circle is the starting point in the left-hand term for each educational aspect, where the fact-based tradition is dominant (next circle outside the subject matter). The normative tradition (bold ellipse) leans more towards nature (biocentrism) and also more outwards in the other aspects. The pluralistic tradition or pluralistic approach (arrows pointing outwards from the center) connects more deeply with the surroundings [21].

#### *5.3. Visualizing Longitudinal Changes in ESE Teaching*

The concept of selective traditions can function as a way to illustrate or visualize how the emphasis of selective teaching traditions in ESE changes over time. This function is important in that it offers a possibility to visualize the shifts in emphasis in teaching due to changes in the curriculum or other external societal pressures on schools [22].

Table 1 shows the four research studies that analyzed teachers' teaching approaches using the concept of selective traditions. The comparison of results from these four studies makes it possible to recognize that the fact-based tradition became more dominant in the Swedish school context after the curriculum changes in 2011 [23].



The results in Table 1 show an increase in the number of teachers teaching in the factbased tradition, although several studies are case studies and not generalizable. However, the table shows that the function of selective ESE traditions to analyze and discern the evolvement of ESE teaching changed over time. The trend towards fact-based teaching is also supported by the results of a coming study of Swedish science teachers in lower secondary school [25]. The increase in fact-oriented teaching may be due to the extended core content in the latest national curriculum of 2011 [23]. The teachers involved in the study said that due to the changes in the curriculum they had to focus more on disciplinary concepts and as a result had less time for group discussions or group work [25].

#### *5.4. Observing the Distribution of ESE Teaching between School Subjects*

The concept of selective traditions can function as a way of observing the distribution of teaching in different subject areas, which can be important extracurricular ESE collaborations. This function offers teacher groups the possibility to discuss the selective traditions that occur in their group and how they are distributed. In order to develop a common teaching approach that offers students a learning environment which embraces facts, values and the development of action competence, there needs to be a variation in the emphasis on different selective traditions. For instance, if all teachers in a collaboration teach in the fact-based tradition, the collaboration could be less fruitful. A variation in selective traditions is thus an important key to success in extracurricular collaborations [16].

In their publication, Borg, Gericke, Höglund and Bergman [6] studied the differences in the distribution of selective traditions among teachers from different subject areas through a large-scale questionnaire study. The emphasis of science teachers' teaching was mostly on the fact-based tradition and that of social science teachers on the pluralistic tradition. Sund, Gericke and Bladh [8] showed that there were some differences in the distribution of the three selective traditions amongst teachers from different subject areas. In this publication, data were gathered from lower secondary school teachers and consisted of responses to a written questionnaire related to analytical questions in order to discern their selective traditions. The science teachers in the study worked in all three selective traditions, whereas the social science teachers mainly worked in the pluralistic tradition. The language teachers in this small sample mostly worked in the normative tradition. Although the sample is small, the results show that science teachers mainly work in the fact-based tradition, while social science teachers work mainly in the pluralistic tradition. Language teachers mainly work in the normative tradition when their teaching is related to sustainability issues [8]. This result is confirmed by those of the previously mentioned large-scale quantitative study [6].

#### *5.5. Recognising Tacit Frameworks—Facilitators of and Obstacles to Teaching Outcomes*

The concept of selective traditions can function as a way of helping teachers to reflect on their tacit frameworks for teaching. These often unreflected frameworks keep teachers in specific, and often habitual, teaching approaches and can appear as obstacles to change and development. The function of tacit framing is to recognize that teachers' teaching traditions can emphasize teaching that in fact goes against the intention of the curriculum change. The consequences of this can be that pupils do not get the kind of teaching that could make them more successful in national tests. This function points to the fact that teachers need to know what their teaching emphasis is in relation to the curriculum changes on ESE issues, i.e., how they adjust their ESE teaching in an informed and systematic way towards change.

In the reviewed publications, selective traditions can be understood as conceptual schemes of what teachers consider good teaching [21]. Van Driel, Bulte and Verloop [26] used three curriculum emphases to study teachers' domain-specific beliefs about the chemistry curriculum for upper secondary education in the Netherlands. They claim that their study serves as an exemplary case of how teachers' domain-specific beliefs can be investigated and taken into account in the context of educational reform. The study clearly showed that teachers' tacit frameworks can hinder curriculum change. Callahan and Dopico [7] claim that this function is important to recognize in teacher education.

Secondary science teachers' selective traditions were studied by Gyllenpalm, Wickman and Holmgren [27]. The curriculum suggested a more inquiry-oriented approach but, even though the descriptions of the teachers' instructional approaches are varied in the interviews, the knowledge aims are generally similar in that they focus on science subject matter. The selective tradition there was used to describe a teacher's habitual way of conducting inquiries. It is evident that a fact-oriented framework is an obstacle to a more open inquiry. Traditions can also act as barriers to a curriculum supporting ESE teaching when implementing holistic ESD at school [24].

A selective tradition can also be an obstacle to the learning of a science content that is better aligned with the ESE content tested in national tests. Swedish national tests in science include a minimum of 20% socio-scientific issues related to the ESE content. A study of the selective traditions in science teachers' practices and the introduction of national testing show that teachers in the fact-based tradition risk missing important tested content [28]. A selective tradition can also become an obstacle in curriculum change.

#### *5.6. Showing the Situated and Social Nature of the Existing Selective Traditions*

The concept of selective traditions can function to show the situatedness or contextsensitive nature of teaching. When data are sorted into different categories in empirical research, their variation and complexity are often reduced. This function of the concept shows that teaching is not static and that the teaching context and social peer environment are important.

The complexity of the reality indicates that teachers cannot always be categorized into one selective tradition as it may depend on the teaching context. This was shown in one of the publications, where in the interviews it became apparent that science teachers worked in three different traditions but that they all showed a tendency towards fact-based teaching when describing their practical work [29]. All the teachers focused on teaching scientific facts and skills, and several of them claimed that their conveyance of what was regarded as real knowledge had changed. This result shows that teaching is contextually sensitive and that teaching approaches are not static.

In another publication, a comparison of the results from two studies in which the same teachers participated showed that individual teachers can switch from mainly working within the pluralistic tradition to the fact-based tradition. In the first part of the second study concerning good tasks in national tests [30], science teachers taught the science content according to all three selective traditions [19]. In the second part concerning the teachers' views of what kind of scientific knowledge and abilities students were expected to develop [30], in group discussions, the teachers appeared to work in the fact-based tradition. This result shows the social nature of teaching approaches and that teachers in groups do not emphasize the same selective traditions as they do individually.

#### *5.7. Promoting Specific Teaching Outcomes*

The concept of selective traditions can function as a theory to promote a specific kind of ESE teaching, most often being the pluralistic teaching tradition. This function highlights the tension between normativity in educational research and practice, and the risk of democratic deficit, which is contradicted between an ESE that tells the student what is right (the normative tradition) and an ESE that aims to provide the student with action competence (the pluralistic tradition). This tension is also related to the needs of the society as contrasted with individuals' emancipation.

In some of the reviewed publications, selective traditions were often used to argue for a specific teaching approach that is suitable for specific reasons. If the long-term purpose of the education is to enhance the development of informed and active young people, conveying factual knowledge is not enough [21]. According to many researchers, ESE could constitute the basis for the development of education for student emancipation and focus on learning in action [10,31]. This means that pupils would need to have educational opportunities to use the knowledge they learn in school in actions outside school [32].

In other publications, the pluralistic tradition embraces democracy [4] and consists of different voices, information, facts and beliefs. In this tradition, values are also important in that they make students aware of the variety of different interests and perspectives. It is important to develop good skills for argumentation in a pluralistic classroom. This is recognized in the international policy debate about ESD that seems to be moving away from a focus on normative behavioral modifications to more democratic pluralistic approaches [33].

#### **6. Discussion**

This section begins with a discussion about the seven discerned functions of the concept of selective traditions identified in the twenty-four publications in relation to educational philosophy and the ESE research outside the literature included in this systematic review. It continues with discussing the implications of the functions for teacher education and in-service training and gives recommendations for using them in hands-on practice.

#### *6.1. The Seven Functions Discussed in Relation to Research Outside This Review Literature*

The first function of combining educational philosophy and environmental problems in teaching is useful in discussions about the differences between EE and ESE. The fact-based tradition and the normative tradition are both oriented towards facts and attitudes, whereas the pluralistic tradition is more process-oriented [21,32]. EE teaching is product-oriented in that specific knowledge needs to be learned about how to solve known environmental problems. This can be compared with ESD 1, where the intended learning outcomes are known [14]. The pluralistic tradition makes use of the same educational content, e.g., subject matter, but as a vehicle in the process of developing abilities through discussions and actions for action competence where the solutions for future challenges are open [34,35]. This is comparable with ESD 2, where the solutions for future challenges are still under debate [14].

The second function is analyzing teaching empirically in order to discern which selective traditions are used. The main point about discerning teachers' selective traditions is not to put teachers into different categories. Selective traditions are not static but are situated in the actual teaching context [29,30]. This is important because it indicates that selective traditions can be changed and adjusted. The analysis of teaching approaches contributes to reflective discussions about and possible changes in the teaching. According to Dewey [36], an analysis of teaching does not mean comparing simple behaviors, but rather looking at the more complex approaches developed by teachers' experiences and disciplinary education at university. In this sense, a selective tradition cannot always be explicitly expressed by the teacher but can be discerned through reflection by using an analytical tool (five educational aspects, Figure 1). However, before one can start reflecting on them, it is essential to acknowledge selective traditions as habitual teaching approaches as this will guide one in the search for ways of changing them [37]. The educational aspects [20] can be used by teachers as a reflection tool to discern their own teaching approach [8]. The point is to encourage teachers to start reflecting on their own teaching, preferably together with peers in groups. This type of group reflection by teachers in one subject area or many, in extracurricular collaborations, is a way of developing collaborative ESE teaching [16].

The third function of visualizing longitudinal changes in teaching is important for discerning changes due to a curriculum change or other change pressures on teachers (Sund and Gericke, in review). The identified fact orientation of the teachers' teaching following the latest Swedish curriculum change in 2011 [25] aligns with a Swedish national policy focus on improving the results of PISA surveys which have been decreasing for more than 15 years [30]. The focus of the latest national curriculum is on more easily assessed factual knowledge than open-ended questions or discerning abilities. This is an international phenomenon in the age of measurement [15] and a way of visualizing the entry of neoliberal forces in schools, where almost everything is expected to be measurable [38,39]. This resembles the discussion about EE versus ESD when the United Nations launched the policy process of entering ESD globally [40]. This function also makes researchers and practitioners reflect on what makes their teaching change.

The fourth function of observing the distribution of teaching in collaborations between school subjects is important for developing cross-curricular ESE teaching collaborations. Some teachers are not always happy about this type of collaboration, even though it is promoted in, e.g., the Swedish national curriculum [23]. Most science teachers are rooted in the fact-based selective tradition [8], as Gayford [41] also similarly found. Gayford

further noted that pluralistic thinking seems to be alien to many science teachers as they mostly emphasize the pluralistic tradition [6,42]. This function is threefold in that it can highlight the disciplinary obstacles for collaborations, show the differences in teaching between subject areas in collaborations and indicate how different teaching approaches can complement each other in collaborations. The research has shown that the teaching in different subject areas differs but can together offer students a more comprehensive ESE learning situation [16].

The fifth function of recognizing tacit frameworks—facilitators of and obstacles to teaching outcomes—is important for discerning teachers' conceptual schemes. This has been important in the relation between research and practice. According to Wickman [43], this relationship has historically occurred in three steps: (a) teacher deficit and social engineering, where conceptual schemes are hardly acknowledged, (b) reflecting practitioners, where conceptual schemes aid the choices of already knowledgeable teachers and (c) the mangling of the conceptual schemes by researchers through practice with the purpose of revising research theory. The results of this literature review and study of the concept of selective traditions align with step two, which is close to the didactic model to develop teaching practices and the teaching profession [44]. The authors' experiences are that in discussions with science teachers in in-service training sessions or when teaching student teachers, most teacher groups recognize and are familiar with the concept of selective traditions. Didactic modeling is one way of developing teaching approaches systematically through different models, such as the teaching dimensions of what, how and why by Klafki [45] and curriculum emphases by Roberts [5].

The sixth function showing the situated and social nature of teaching is important for showing how context-sensitive the teaching and selective traditions are. When teachers discussed the importance of practical work in the study by Sund and Wickman [29], they all emphasized the fact-based tradition. This can involve anthropocentric views of nature in excursions and systematically observing the surroundings. Observers are not part of nature, but can be regarded as external observers [46]. Another example of this anthropocentric view is practical work in the laboratory, where nature is manipulated by humans [47]. This function shows that teachers easily embrace certain scientific roles. In one study, when teachers discussed socio-scientific issues in national tests in groups, they all entered into a rational scientific discourse [30]. Östman [48] discovered something similar and explained it as a disciplinary hegemonic discourse that has been common in science teaching since the 17th century. This might look like a historical event, but it can still be a challenge in teacher education. In teacher education, students can often revert to the disciplinary teaching traditions that they learned from others, which can in turn become obstacles in discussions about pluralistic teaching approaches or work in collaborative extracurricular settings [30].

The seventh function of selective traditions is promoting specific teaching outcomes. The promotion can be about developing a more democratic teaching that supports students' development of emancipation and action competence [49–51]. Theoretical discussions inspired by John Dewey [52] concern important aspects of teaching, such as democracy [11,15,53]. The normative tradition is democratically questionable [4]. The democratic participatory approach is a prerequisite for developing pupils' action competences [34]. In teaching practice, research and at the policy level for global development, the learning outcomes of EE/ESD/ESE have increasingly been translated into a number of competences for sustainable development, e.g., critical thinking, collaborative decision-making, future scenario skills and action competence [54]. The underlying educational idea is to empower young people by developing key competencies. Key competencies are something to achieve, whereas action competence is an ongoing teaching approach that encourages pupils to use the knowledge and abilities they have learned at school to guide their actions. Action competence is an educational ideal [34]. Promotion of developed action competence teaching enables pupils to deal with the often-complex societal challenges of sustainable development [35].

#### *6.2. Implications for Teacher Education and in-Service Training*

The first question to confront Callahan and Dopico [7] when reading about selective traditions was, "Do teachers teach in the same way as they were taught?" If this is the case, we need to analyze the selective traditions that were prevalent when they were studying to become teachers. This is an example of requested further research on selective traditions. Knowing how student teachers are trained in teacher education courses can help us to understand more about how our children will learn about global developmental challenges in the future. The second question for Callahan and Dopico [7] was, "Which part of our teaching is canonical and which is personal input or contributes to the development of universal knowledge?" Learning a discipline is one thing, but teaching it is another. The teachers' disciplinary traditions meet the pupils' everyday knowledge in the classroom. The canonical parts of the discipline meet a transformed school science in the textbooks [55].

It would be fruitful if teacher education institutions could visualize and discuss selective traditions and show how they can work as tacit frameworks for student teachers learning when becoming teachers and also as obstacles to change in school [43,55]. An important question to start asking in teacher education is, "What is new in this curriculum compared to my everyday teaching?" The answer might be a slightly different way of teaching a subject and align towards a selective tradition different from the current practice.

The seven functions of the concept of selective traditions discerned in this review can contribute to a better understanding of how more emancipating, democratic and transforming ESE teaching can be developed. The functions illuminate important qualitative discussions when teaching is developed systematically. Five of the functions are useful in the practice-oriented hands-on development of ESE teaching in teacher education and in-service training, while the other two functions (visualizing and observing) are useful for observing the changes in and distribution of ESE teaching at a school, national and international level.

These functions can be used to develop the teachers' teaching and the learners' learning of skills in alignment with the needs globally. The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) set an agenda for action to contribute to effectively improving life on our shared planet. In effect, they set a policy direction aiming for significant improvements by 2030 [56,57]. Goal 4 attends to the need for quality education for all, and target 4.7 requires that all learners acquire the knowledge and skills needed to promote sustainable development, including explicit education for sustainable development.

#### **7. Conclusions**

Discussions about how a transformation of teaching occurs (or not) begin with educational philosophies, the root causes of developmental challenges, rational discourses, disciplinary traditions, curriculum changes, external pressures and market forces, all of which are essential for systematic and democratic changes in ESE teaching. Research on the concept of selective traditions has shown that there are many functions to consider when discussing and analyzing ESE teaching for the future in research and practice, as outlined in this review. The seven functions of the selective traditions identified in this study can be a valuable contribution in this endeavor to develop and analyze ESE teaching locally as well as globally in alignment with the SDGs.

**Author Contributions:** The conceptualization, methodology, analysis, and writing of the research article was collectively done by all the authors. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

**Funding:** This research was supported by the ROSE (Research on Subject-specific Education), Karlstad University.

**Institutional Review Board Statement:** This study is following Swedish research ethical guidelines.

**Informed Consent Statement:** This study is following Swedish research ethical guidelines.

**Data Availability Statement:** See references regarding literature review.

**Conflicts of Interest:** The authors declare no conflict of interest.

#### **References**


### *Article* **A Didactic Model of Sustainability Commitment**

**Johan Öhman 1,\* and Louise Sund 1,2**


**\*** Correspondence: johan.ohman@oru.se

**Abstract:** This article proposes a model that describes and frames sustainability commitment. The model is based on didactic theory and pragmatic philosophy and is informed by several empirical studies on environmental and sustainability education (ESE) practice. The intention is for the model to serve as a critical perspective on ESE practices in secondary and upper secondary schools, and to offer a framework for the development of future practice with emphasis on teachers' choices of content and teaching methods. The model suggests that a sound commitment is situated in the intersection of the intellectual, emotional, and practical aspects of sustainability. It is argued that: The intellectual aspect is essential for giving the commitment scientific rigor and a critical stance; emotions are vital for students to become dedicated; and skills to carry out appropriate actions for change is necessary for playing an active role in providing a sustainable transformation of society.

**Keywords:** education; didactics; teaching; learning; pragmatism; sustainability commitment

#### **1. Introduction**

From the Agenda 21 plan of action to the adoption of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development there has been an international policy aspiration to reorient and implement education towards sustainable development. The broader Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4 (quality education), and specifically SDG 4.7: "By 2030, ensure that all learners acquire the knowledge and skills needed to promote sustainable development, including, among others, through Education for Sustainable Development and sustainable lifestyles, human rights, gender equality, promotion of a culture of peace and nonviolence, global citizenship and appreciation of cultural diversity and of culture's contribution to sustainable development" [1] (p. 8), give added impetus to the sustainability themes that have emerged in various educational policy papers published at the national level, particularly in Western Europe/the global North.

The inclusion of sustainability themes in educational policy also raises questions about educational and teaching goals and choices of content, forms, and methods. In recent decades schools all over the world have been addressing this challenge [2]. Depending on country, environmental and sustainability education (ESE) can be a subject, an aspect of civics or of citizenship education, or a broader cross-curricular theme. Exploring the relationship between education and sustainable development, Vare and Scott [3] have emphasized the importance of seeing sustainable development as a social learning process (as opposed to a set of pre-determined behaviors), which concerns the building of capacity to think critically about and explore the dilemmas and contradictions inherent in sustainable transformation. Scott [4] argues that building this capacity is a central aim of schools:

In terms of sustainability, then, the purpose of schools might be seen as stimulating young people's development of awareness and interest in relation to living sustainably with the hope (but not certainty) that this will give rise to social participation that can contribute, for example, to the goals of greater social justice and human well-being, and the bolstering of the resilience of ecological systems (p. 413).

**Citation:** Öhman, J.; Sund, L. A Didactic Model of Sustainability Commitment. *Sustainability* **2021**, *13*, 3083. https://doi.org/10.3390/ su13063083

Academic Editor: David González-Gómez

Received: 3 December 2020 Accepted: 8 March 2021 Published: 11 March 2021

**Publisher's Note:** MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

**Copyright:** © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/).

In this article, we refer to Scott's suggestion of the purpose of schools as supporting the creation of students' *sustainability commitment*. By sustainability commitment we mean a desire and ability to contribute to a sustainable transformation of our world. The question is, what is the content and structure of a commitment to sustainable development? What can be considered to be an ethically and politically sound commitment? How might teachers support the development of such a commitment? The purpose of this article is to suggest a model that describes and frames sustainability commitment and tentatively answers these questions. The intention is for the model to provide critical perspective on ESE practices in secondary and upper secondary schools that will serve as a framework for the development of future practice with emphasis on teachers' choices of content and methods when teaching on sustainability issues.

The model is based on Nordic and German didactic theory [5] and John Dewey's pragmatic philosophy [6–11] and is the result of years of empirical study conducted by the research group SMED (Studies of Meaning-making in Educational Discourses) (for an overview of this research see [12,13]). In this article, we use empirical examples collected from a recent research project called "Teaching global equity and justice issues through a critical lens" (Swedish Research Council, project number 2017-03468) to illustrate the different aspects of the model and the related teacher actions.

#### **2. Background: Key Competencies and Action Competence**

We begin by reviewing earlier significant research and different attempts to define the content and structure of sustainability awareness and interest. The focus is on two specific areas of research: key competencies and action competence.

In numerous articles and reports, the strategy to address the sustainability challenge has been translated into interconnecting and associated combinations of key competencies for sustainable development [14–17]. Key competencies are described as critical reference points for developing curricula and courses [17] and "the ambitious knowledge and skill profile of students expected to be future 'problem solvers,' 'change agents,' and 'transition managers'" [16] (p. 204). At the policy level, and based on (among other references) the above research, UNESCO has identified eight cross-cutting key competencies for sustainability that are of particular importance for thinking and acting in favor of and advancing sustainable development: systems thinking competency, anticipatory competency, normative competency, strategic competency, collaboration competency, critical thinking competency, self-awareness competency and integrated problem-solving competency [1] (p. 10). Rieckmann [18] also provides an overview of some of the competences that are needed to deal with sustainability challenges. Key competencies are essential for individuals to become "sustainability citizens" [19] and are what active and critical sustainability citizens will need in order to deal with complexity and uncertainty, design strategies to address these aspects and, perhaps most importantly, change their own lifestyles to reflect a more sustainable and just society [1,20] and open the door to sustainable development. The key competencies are also useful when constructing educational programs on sustainable development (a broader end) and describing what students will need to live sustainably (output).

However, there is also substantial critique towards key competencies as an educational concept (for an overview of this critique see [21]). Willbergh [21] argues that that "the term loses its meaning when implemented into practice and simply designates performance and skills" (p. 336). Key competencies are based on the idea that we can predict what is needed in the future. However, assessing competencies of the future is very difficult and there is a problem with competence as an educational concept as it assumes that what is judged to be keys to success today will be context-independent and stable [21]. Furthermore, the problem is that there is still no agreement as to what key competences in general really are [14], which is important when it comes to identifying context-specific key competencies for sustainability. There is a lack of theoretical anchoring and empirical evidence to show which competencies are crucial and sufficient for living sustainably, or that enable students

to take part in sustainability problem-solving. Furthermore, these core competencies have not been the main focus of formal education [18] (p. 45). Although the Global Action Program (GAP) aims to expand and mainstream Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) at all levels and in all areas of education, we know very little about competencies that are essential for sustainability in formal education and how they are connected to teaching–learning relationships. Key competencies also focus on a specific goal or learning outcomes in the form of capacities and skills [16,18], rather than on the learning process and the educational content. Another question concerns the implementation of competence orientation and how to incorporate it into the teaching practice; something that is hampered by didactic challenges such as how to move the focus from the "what competencies" question to that of "how can concrete competencies be fostered?" [22] (p. 9). Thus, although the key competence concept has been valuable at the program level, it gives teachers little guidance when it comes to organizing classroom practice.

More oriented towards teaching and learning is the concept of action competence [23,24]. As noted by the Danish researchers who coined the phrase "action competence" as an educational concept, there is an important difference between viewing "competence" as a countable word with plural forms (outcomes that include certain core competencies) and "competence" as an educational philosophical ideal associated with "being able, and willing, to be a qualified participant" [23] (p. 473). An action competence approach is skeptical of educational paradigms in environmental and sustainability education that regard the educational task as a question of behavior modification: "Through the spectacles of action competence, you may look for and ask for and measure different (key) competencies, but action competence will not be one of them. Action competence will be the lens that makes some types of knowledge, skills, qualifications, competencies, abilities, and action readiness more educationally important and valuable than others" [23] (p. 67). Some researchers [4,23,24] argue that there is a need for a form of teaching that focuses on the development of critical thinking skills, dialogue and debate (naturally integrated into the focus on content) and on how students "acquire the courage, commitment and desire to get involved in the social interests concerning these subjects (naturally based on understanding and insight)" [23] (p. 472).

In keeping with Jensen and Schnack [23], we relate commitment to students' motivation and assertiveness, both of which are crucial for turning knowledge about sustainability problems/issues into action. A sustainable commitment is situated and personal at the same time, in that it needs to be relational and informed by a social context. It is, therefore, an ongoing commitment over time. Compared to the key competencies for sustainability, a commitment speaks back to you, in the sense that you want to do something. However, in a sound commitment this desire to act must, as Jensen and Schnack [23] put it, be "based on understanding and insight" (p. 472). To be more precise, we argue that it needs to be based on scientific knowledge and ethical and political insights.

Action competence is now receiving more scholarly attention, particularly in the context of interpreting the concept as a latent competence or as an overarching educational approach. To redefine action competence, Sass, Boeve-de Pauw, Olsson, Gericke, De Maeyer and Van Petegem [25] break down action competence into "the willingness, commitment, knowledge, skills and confidence to engage in finding solutions to controversial problems or issues" (p. 6). The authors offer an overview and current usage of the concept of action competence in sustainable development research and undertake a critical discussion of how the term can be seen as the "competence of people to engage in solving sustainability issues" (p. 1). We see this attempt as an interesting way of theoretically conceptualizing competence and believe that by empirically engaging the theoretical perspective with classroom practice and building a model on didactic theory we can add another layer to the knowledge/aspect of approaching ESE from a competence point of view, i.e., in order to incorporate sustainability commitment into teaching practice, we need to add an idea about the content, the different components and aspects of such a commitment, and a theory about how students make this content their own. To develop a model for this, we

turn to John Dewey's educative view of experience and Klafki's didactic theory on how the content "becomes something" in the educational situation.

#### **3. Research Process**

The study relies on two theoretical perspectives—didactics and pragmatism—both providing complex and comprehensive understandings of teaching practice and students' learning. The suggested didactic model of sustainability commitment has been developed through abduction or retroduction [26,27], where the theoretical explanations have been tested against empirical data material in a back and forth process. According to Charles Sanders Peirce [27], the term abduction originates from a misunderstanding and a mistranslation and should instead be called retroduction (see CP 1.65). Building on and interpreting Peirce's work, Glynos and Howarth [28] explain that retroductive reasoning generates a new standard of explanation and captures the process by which a researcher adopts hypotheses and constructs theories. Retroductive reasoning starts with studying the facts (observations derived from experience) and devising a plausible conjecture or hypothesis (theory) to explain them. As Peirce [27] puts it: "abduction, although it is very little hampered by logical rules, nevertheless is logical inference, asserting its conclusion only problematically or conjecturally, it is true, but nevertheless having a perfectly definite logical form" (CP 5.188, p. 3794). Using the retroductive method, we seek to build theory from practice, or as described by Walsh [29], "theorizing from and with praxis" (p. 84), to contribute a praxis point of view to empirically engage the theoretical perspective with classroom practice.

#### **4. Theoretical Perspectives**

In the following, we present the two theoretical perspectives that have guided the retroductive process: Nordic and German didactic theory (Didaktik) and John Dewey's pragmatic theory on experience. We outline the basic ideas of these perspectives that have influenced the development of the model of sustainability commitment.

#### *4.1. Didaktik: The Question of Educational Content*

Nordic and German didactic theory encompasses general ideas about the role and purpose of schools in society and that which directly affects the teaching process. One way of structuring an understanding of Didaktik is to start from the three main questions in education: why?—the motives of education, what?—the content of education and how?—the methods used in education [30].

At a societal level, the why question addresses the purpose of schools and the visions of an ideal society. It also considers the role of the school in preparing students for life in a democracy/democratic processes. The what question concerns the standards on which to base the choice of content and the grounds on which a certain material is chosen. Even in a fixed and compulsory curriculum, teachers have a significant amount of freedom to decide which content to use. The question therefore is, which central and important content should be selected and presented in each case in the frames and circumstances set by society and the school? The what question also concerns how to structure, organize, and present the content. The how question deals with the choice of work methods and approaches. It also emphasizes how students can achieve the goals that have been set for the education, which includes an understanding of the learning process that takes place when teachers and students mutually enact the content, and how the role of the teacher is perceived.

In the Nordic and German Didaktik tradition, the what question about the educational content is particularly important. As we see it, the strength of this tradition is that it problematizes how teaching can unlock the educational potential of a given content and allow students to turn matter into meaning [31,32]. In this tradition, the curriculum outlines a certain content for the teaching, but is not seen as something that explicitly direct a teacher's work. Rather, the curriculum is viewed as something "that can only become educative

when interpreted and given life by teachers" [33] (p. 177). According to Hudson [33], this tradition emphasizes that teachers can exercise substantial professional autonomy and have the freedom to teach without the control of a curriculum. Thus, didactic considerations include what a teacher needs to respond to and how to create the conditions required for students' learning. To select educational content, the renowned German didactic theorist Wolfgang Klafki suggests five basic questions of "didactic analysis" [5,34,35]. These mutually dependent questions represent the basis for selecting and working with the content of a teacher's daily lessons. The first question focuses on exemplarity: "What wider or general sense or reality does this content exemplify and open up to the learner?" The second question is aimed at the meaning and contemporary significance of the content for the students in the class. With the third question, Klafki asks about the future meaning of the content. After having pedagogically placed the content in the context of its educational potential regarding the exemplary, present and future relevance for the student (questions 1-3), Klafki turns to the fourth question about the wider context of this content and how it can be broken down. Finally, the fifth question focuses on accessibility and how the content can become interesting and approachable: "What is the body of knowledge which must be retained ("minimum knowledge") if the content determined by these questions is to be considered "acquired", as a "vital", "working" human possession?" [34].

A crucial aspect of content is the difference that Klafki makes between matter and meaning, which means the content as such (*Inhalt*) and its educational substance (*Gehalt*). Hopmann [31] emphasizes that this difference is not simply one of facts and beliefs: "they are what they are by the substance meeting the teacher and the student while meeting the content" (p. 116). He continues by saying that "meaning is what emerges when the content is enacted in a classroom based on the methodological decisions of a teacher, i.e., his or her pedagogical freedom" (p. 117). What Klafki's didactic perspective contributes is how the content becomes something in the educational situation and when students actually learn it. This is close to pragmatists' claim that the meaning of concepts must be brought out or "cashed out" in experiential terms and consequences (see below). William James [36] (Lecture 2) used cash-value metaphorically to describe that a meaningful concept must be related to empirical observations: "You must bring out of each word its practical cash-value, set it at work within the stream of your experience." This means that a teacher selecting the content must consider and critically analyze the meanings that students create and how it might help them to achieve "the abilities of self-determination, co-determination and solidarity" [34] (p. 14). Klafki understands knowledge as situated, contextual and normative and his development of a critical perspective is infused with a focus on reacting to social conditions and processes that work against a more just society.

Klafki's ideas about how content can become accessible to and approachable for students is of central importance for the suggested sustainability commitment model. We would also like to add how the content can become actionable, defined as having practical value for the students to act on [37]. We understand the concept of commitment as being in line with the didactic concept of *Bildung* and the way in which teaching "opens up a world for the student, thus opening the student for the world" [31] (p. 115). In contrast to a key competence approach which is built on anticipated skills for the future, the Bildung concept focuses on engaging with students to understand what matters to them and their future and ethical choices. Willbergh [21] argues that the educational idea of Bildung is to support student independence, so that "the younger generations themselves will be able to decide in the future what they consider to be useful, successful and last but not least, ethical" (p. 341).

To unfold what it means in terms of students' learning to open up for the world and take responsibility for the future, we turn to John Dewey's pragmatic philosophy and especially his concept of experience.

#### *4.2. Pragmatism: Experience and Relationality*

In developing our didactic model of sustainability commitment, Dewey's notion of experience as indispensable to all learning is essential [11]. It is through the process of experience that we learn to (practically, emotionally and intellectually) navigate our course as individuals and as a pluralistic society.

Dewey [11] describes experience as an interplay that involves the interaction between objective conditions (equipment, books, materials including "what is done by the educator and the way in which it is done", p. 45) and the student's internal conditions (previous experiences manifested as acquired habits). It is by acting and undergoing the consequences of our actions in a specific situation that we develop an understanding or grasp the meaning of the situation, or to use Dewey's words, "to see it in its relations to other things: to note how it operates or functions, what consequences follow from it, what causes it can be put to" [9] (p. 225). Thus, knowledge is intimately connected with action, or the happening of experienced things. As Dewey [7] explains: "to discover the conditions and consequences of [experience] happening/ ... /can take place only by modifying the given qualities in such ways that relations become manifest" (p. 84). We can therefore understand these manifested relations as practical, emotional, and intellectual aspects of our habits.

According to Dewey [11], every (genuine) experience modifies us, and in a sense, "the world". When individuals live through a learning experience, they are not only actors of the world, but are also receptive to and undergo the world, and thus need to be able to question and change previous habits of acting, feeling and thinking: "For 'taking in' in any vital experience is something more than placing something on the top of consciousness over what was previously known. It involves reconstruction which may be painful" [10] (p. 41).

This experiential understanding of learning means that student learning is not an invisible mental process that is carried in the head, but something that is in the practices or situations in which the students are involved and respond to through action. For the teacher, choosing the situations in which this interaction takes place and considering the whole learning environment to adapt to the needs of the student group is an important task. For Dewey [11], this means that the teacher is the one with "the greater maturity of experience" and who therefore needs to organize and evaluate the direction in which the students' experiences are heading ("what it moves toward and into") (p. 38).

From Dewey's pragmatic perspective, a complete and entire learning process (experience) consists of a series of overlapping elements or aspects, where disciplinary knowledge is not sufficient to reach a situation that involves concern for someone or something: "It is not possible to divide in a vital experience the practical, emotional, and intellectual from one another and to set the properties of one over against the characteristics of the others. The *emotional* phase binds parts together into a single whole; '*intellectual'* simply names the fact that the experience has meaning; '*practical'* indicates that the organism is interacting with events and objects which surround it." [10] (p. 55, our emphasis).

According to Dewey, an experience has a unity that is constituted by a quality that pervades the entire experience. The existence of unity is not strictly emotional, practical, or intellectual, as these distinctions are made in hindsight, by way of reflection. Furthermore, the experience is not the sum of these different characters: "They are phases, emotionally and practically distinguished, of a developing underlying quality; they are its moving variations, not separate and independent" [10] (p. 37).

Following Dewey, and to sum up, the intellectual, emotional, and practical aspects represent different phases or aspects of human nature. The intellectual aspect represents rationality, understanding, reason, responsibility etc., the emotional aspect represents sensibility, emotion, spontaneity, devotion etc., and the practical aspect indicates "our dealings with things" [10] (p. 193), events and objects that surround us. There is no intrinsic (psychological) division between these aspects of experience, but for didactic reasons it is often fruitful to make an analytical distinction between the practical, emotional, and intellectual—and it is this that constitutes the core of our model for sustainability commitment.

#### **5. Empirical Input**

The empirical input for the development of the suggested didactic model is based on several projects and studies of ESE practices in secondary schools (See for example: [38–44].). In this article, we specifically use empirical examples collected from a recent research project called "Teaching global equity and justice issues through a critical lens" (Swedish Research Council, project number 2017-03468) to illustrate the model and make it more comprehensible and tangible. This project examined how Swedish upper secondary school teachers take up the most pressing sustainability problems facing the world today in their teaching practices, such as migration, climate change, and social and economic inequalities. The empirical examples are gathered from the classroom observations and interviews with teachers and students. They allow us to illustrate what the different aspects might look like in educational practice and how teachers guide students' inquiries in relation to the different aspects of a sustainability commitment. It is important to stress that the empirical data does not say anything about a sustainability commitment per se, but focuses on teaching and learning processes. However, the data exemplifies how commitment may emerge and how teachers can support this in educational practice. Since data is used only to illustrate our argument, we leave out the full details of the research design of the project. Nor do we detail the larger data set which includes transcripts of the interactions between teachers and their student groups.

#### **6. A Didactic Model of Sustainability Commitment**

Based on the empirical studies, didactic theory and Dewey's ideas about experience and learning outlined above, we argue that a commitment should consist of three interrelated aspects: an intellectual aspect, an emotional aspect, and a practical aspect. For students to develop a sound sustainability commitment, it is important that they are presented with a variety of learning experiences that will help them to:


The basic components and structure of this sustainability commitment model are presented in Figure 1. In the following, we describe the different aspects of the model and the related didactic principles in more detail. Although for reasons of clarity we describe the aspects separately, it is important to underline that it is the reciprocal relationship between these aspects that forms the conditions for a sustainability commitment based on scientific knowledge and ethical and political insights. In this way, we could say that a sound sustainability commitment lies at the intersection of the intellectual, emotional, and practical.

#### *6.1. The Intellectual Aspect*

The intellectual aspect of sustainability commitment is in two parts: (a) students' rational knowledge about sustainability issues and (b) students' own relationship to this knowledge in terms of their epistemic, ethical, and political position or location.

Every school subject has content knowledge or disciplinary knowledge that students are expected to learn. The process of selecting and introducing subject content is a fundamental aspect of teaching sustainability issues. It is reasonable to stress that some of this knowledge involves understanding nature and the biosphere (i.e., ecosystem services, biodiversity, and the carbon cycle). Essential knowledge arguably also concerns

the relationships between humanity and the biosphere (i.e., poverty reduction, economic development, and climate change).

**Figure 1.** Aspects of a sustainability commitment.

Choosing teaching content ("facts") is not a value neutral process, as the selection of facts and descriptions of the world always involve value judgements [45]. Teaching content is not just a matter of which knowledge should be learned, but also includes paying attention to the values that accompany the subject content, the teaching methods that will be used and the teachers' aims (the "companion meanings") [46,47]. An important principle for the choice of content is that facts, examples, and resources should be obtained from various sources. Another is that teachers' choices of the "what" content should include a critical perspective or standpoint in the sustainability learning process. Although we acknowledge the insights into the development of a critical perspective on the teaching content that Klafki has offered, we also want to draw attention to postcolonial and decolonial perspectives as critical modes that can illuminate the ethical principle of responsibility for others and offer alternative perspectives on international development by challenging ethnocentrism and addressing issues of complicity [48–50]. Other examples are post-humanist perspectives that stress humans' complicity in the significant damage to ecosystems, ethical relations with more than human beings [51–53] and critical materialist perspectives that take the historical and critical commitments of environmental education seriously [54]. Perspectives such as these can help teachers and educators to go deeper into the causes and roots of events and engage students in thoughtful communication, thus opening up the possibility for a praxis that supports an ethical and complex approach to the teaching of sustainability issues and evokes new questions and possible responses (e.g., what is emphasized and what is marginalized?). A critical perspective can also be a useful tool in the process of choosing teaching content that will help teachers to identify the kind of knowledge and skills that will enable students to make important choices for sustainable transformation.

However, knowing about the world is not enough. Students also need to relate to/position themselves to this knowledge and consider their role in a sustainable future [55]. This can find expression in epistemic, ethical, and political ways. The epistemic way means knowledge about how the students' own lives are connected to the world, what they depend on and how they influence the world (i.e., consumption, ecological footprint). Ethical ways of relating to the knowledge gained include adopting different ethical principles and ideas about rights and obligations, as well as rational thinking and standpoints concerning good values and right actions, i.e., the morally right way of living your life (including questions about the intrinsic value of biodiversity, the rights of future generations, obligations to people in other parts of the world etc.). Students also need to position themselves politically in relation to the knowledge they have learned and reflect on different conflicting ideas about a just and equal society (i.e., a socially just allocation of natural resources, democratic decision-making, and distribution of power).

From a Deweyan perspective, an intellectual aspect can be considered to be a "rational phase of reflective inquiry" [6] (p. 209), i.e., reflective inquiry as a kind of thinking. However, that does not create a genuine engagement unless students also have opportunities to emotionally grapple with sustainability problems and relate them to their own lives.

#### *6.2. The Emotional Aspect*

Dewey [10] argues that in a vital and living experience emotions are not just things that happen to us, but that they actually play an important role in our lives and in rational thinking. Students' emotional responses to disciplinary knowledge and their relations to sustainability issues are crucial for a deeper commitment to and understanding of how sustainability issues relate to them personally. Students' emotional responses can be of a political nature (relating the future organization of a just and equal society/world) or moral nature (relating to responsible and caring relationships between humans or between humans and animals/plants/ecosystems).

Several researchers in the ESE field have highlighted the importance of emotions as a moving force and that reason (knowledge) and emotion are mutual and inseparable when learning about sustainability issues [56–61]. Hicks and Bord [57] hold that an emotional response "appears to occur when knowing shifts from being something intellectual and detached to a personal and connected knowing./ ... /Most importantly the emotional responses experienced by students need to be accepted and seen as part of a shared experience" (415f.). Similarly, Ojala [58,59] maintains that learning about sustainability problems affects and stirs up emotions and that this is not something that teachers should try to get rid of or try to "change". Drawing on earlier research in the field, Ojala [59] cautions against trying to steer students' emotions and categorize them as right or wrong, because that can turn education into indoctrination [60,62]. A crucial point that Ojala makes, and that is applicable to a sustainability commitment, is that emotions are not the enemy of reason but rather an important part of it. Of course, negative emotions such as denial of the seriousness of climate change can be negatively related to engagement [63]. However, other negative emotions, such as worrying about climate change and worsening inequality, can actually be a driving force for critically reflecting on, discussing and perhaps challenging some of our assumptions about the way we live and the way we interact with each other and the environment. Thus, worry can be a first step towards a wider public interest. Consequently, as teachers we need to raise awareness of emotion regulation strategies that promote students' critical awareness and engagement, respond to their feelings and worries and constructively try to handle and cope with emotions [59]. Equally, it is important to promote students' critical emotional competence that also acknowledges structural and cultural factors. For example, treating emotions and coping strategies as entirely private affairs might counteract the transition towards a more sustainable society. As Ojala [59] argues, a strongly individualized approach to emotions prevents young people from developing a critical and alternative view of society.

Drawing on Todd [64] and Mouffe [65], Sund and Öhman [60] have argued for the importance of dealing with conflicts passionately in ESE, given that emotions are key "drivers" for creating relations to the world and taking a political stand for or against something. They also conclude that our values and principles continuously change in relation to specific and situated contexts. Following Todd [64], they claim that this change is provoked by others in all their differences and is a potential source of new thought. In their empirical case study, Håkansson and Östman [56] also show how affection can be transformed into political emotions in teaching and learning settings and form the basis of an inquiry leading to political meaning-making.

Emotions in the form of moral reactions can also be grounds for ethical reflection. The teaching content itself can evoke a spontaneous moral response, but "it can also be the case that the teacher deliberately wants to provoke a moral experience, for example, by showing a movie or reading a text which concerns the students and arouse their emotional responses" [66] (p. 98). To start teaching concrete cases based on students' moral experiences connects to Dewey's view of morality as lived practice and contextual [67]. What is experienced depends on what we bring to a situation. Habits and ways of life determine how we (inter)act in a situation and coordinate our actions with others: "The emotional aspects of experience are always the result of a transaction between the organism and the environment. Emotional appreciation is about something that in a situation is experienced as having certain qualities" [67] (p. 223). Thus, morality arises and takes shape in relation to others, and here emotions can have an important function.

#### *6.3. The Practical Aspect*

Knowledge and emotions are not much use when it comes to a sustainable transformation if you do not know how to act. The third aspect of our model for a sustainable commitment is therefore the practical and focuses on students' actions and action competencies. Sustainable Development Goal 4.7 points to the important responsibility of schools to develop students' abilities to play an active part in the transformation towards a sustainable society. In this transformation, and as mentioned previously, what kind of knowledge will be needed is by no means obvious. Therefore, students need to be given an active role as producers of knowledge and teachers in turn need to help them to develop their abilities and desires to play an active role in this transformation. Knowing how to act and being able to act are essential components of a sustainability commitment. Transformative actions can be moral (actions at the individual level, such as saving electricity and water by changing your lifestyle) or political (actions that relate to societal change, e.g., writing an email to a politician). Furthermore, actions can be deliberative (discussing and affecting), practical (sorting waste), or innovative (starting an environmental group).

The practical aspect connects to the foregoing discussion of a pragmatic understanding of experience and Dewey's view of action as a crucial part of knowledge, rather than something that is passively perceived [8,68]. As explained by Dewey [10], we encounter others in "our dealings with things", through actions and their consequences. Therefore, in the suggested model we depart from the view that students learn in and through their interactions with their environment.

As already indicated, action competence has been a concept in the ESE field since the 1980s. This approach points to teaching "that can help students develop their ability, motivation and desire to play an active role in finding democratic solutions to sustainability issues" (cf. [23,24]) (p. 62). A key notion in this concept is the difference between "activity" and "action", where an action is focused on solutions to a problem and has a perspective that directly enacts change. Mogensen and Schnack [24] also underline the importance of considering the educational significance of the objective content of the actions, the circumstances to which the actions are addressed, and that actions (as distinct from activities) are qualified by the intentions of the agent and by being conscious and purposive.

Furthermore, Mogensen and Schnack [24] argue that the notion of action in action competence has philosophical and educational significance. Action competence refers to

an educational ideal and is thus closely "linked to democratic, political education and to a radical version of the notion of '*Bildung*'" [24] (p. 60). The democratic perspective implies that the concept is not context defined, in the sense that it points towards specific actions or visions for a sustainable future. Nonetheless, it is prescriptive in that it relates to issues in an impartial and critically responsible manner and bases our actions on the possible and relevant answers we find—thus supporting open-ended and pluralistic forms of education. We regard the practical aspect to be in line with this definition.

#### **7. The Role of the Teacher: Teacher Moves**

Teachers play an essential role in students' development of a critical understanding of sustainability issues and, ultimately, in their awareness and interest in relation to living sustainably. As Dewey [11] claims: "Teachers are the agents through which knowledge and skills are communicated and rules of conduct enforced" (p.18). The task of the teacher is to select and present a certain content (*Inhalt*) and to guide, direct and navigate students' inquiries so that they make the content their own (*Gehalt*). In didactic theory, the teacher is seen as an autonomous reflective practitioner, where the curriculum constitutes the frame for the teacher's choices [42]. This means that "Teachers should not just be able to choose and practice appropriate methods to teach a certain given content but also be able to understand which content should be selected within the frames given by society and the circumstances set by their school and their students" [69] (p. 146).

Teachers' didactic choices can be understood as teacher moves [70]. Teacher moves are the different actions that a teacher carries out to create a learning environment for the students. These moves relate to teachers' didactic choices of content and methods and their didactic reasoning. The moves can basically be of two kinds: staging an inquiry (the actions that teachers make to encourage the students' own activities and to initiate an inquiry process) and scene-setting (teachers' actions that guide, direct, and navigate students in ongoing inquiry processes).

Thus, a teacher's role in the development of a sound commitment can be understood as staging and scene-setting moves that are directed towards the intellectual, emotional, and practical aspects of sustainability commitment (see Figure 2). This relates to the choices that teachers make in their planning and the actions they carry out in the classroom in their direct interactions with students. It is difficult to overestimate the importance of the teacher in the organizing of the conditions that will enhance the students' experiences (and the subject-matter of the study). Teachers are crucial for creating a balance between the different aspects of commitment and for challenging the students to deepen their standpoints and arguments [71,72].

Even though we frame these moves as stemming from the teacher, it is important to highlight that they are relational and dynamic, which means that the moves are not isolated actions in relation to the students' actions. What teachers do in their classrooms (their moves) should in this sense be understood in relation to their didactical choices and the students' responses and answers to the teachers' moves (we refer to this as reflective interaction between participants, teachers, and students). The literature on teacher professionalism points out that a key aspect of being a professional is being able to act from certain aims in relation to the specific context in which one acts [73,74]. This is one of the reasons why we think it is important to illustrate the moves as stemming from the teacher—the teacher has some didactical aims with the lesson, while at the same time the particular meaning and the specific routes the moves take are dependent on the students' actions and responses. Thus, the moves should be understood as context dependent.

**Figure 2.** Teachers' moves in relation to students' sustainability commitment.

#### **8. Empirical Illustrations: Teaching for a Sustainability Commitment**

In this section, we use empirical examples to illustrate the different aspects of the suggested model and their associated processes. These empirical illustrations are meant to highlight how teachers work towards supporting the creation of students' sustainability commitment in their practice. It should be noted, however, that not all teachers are equally able to develop such skills, nor equally motivated to develop competence in their students. The varying quality and conviction of individual teachers is not addressed here, but we demonstrate how teachers can encourage their students and set the scene for their inquiries in relation to the various aspects of a sustainability commitment. Rather than ideals these examples show what teachers do in everyday teaching situations.

#### *8.1. The Intellectual Aspect in Practice*

This first example shows how a teacher encourages the development of the intellectual aspect of her students' sustainability commitment (Box 1). In this lesson, the students (year 11) are given the opportunity to explore the document entitled The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) in a global politics course. During the lesson, the students are encouraged to identify conflicts relating to this declaration,

discuss different arguments and state their own standpoints. As preparation, the teacher, Alice, posted UNDRIP's 46 articles on the school's web portal together with a news article explaining the fact that four countries first voted to oppose the resolution but later adopted it. The lesson begins with Alice reminding the students that four countries voted against the declaration: "And their claim was that this threatened their national sovereignty. So, I want to see if you can argue for their case. So, four countries voted no to this declaration. Which countries were they? Does it have anything to do with the colonial past?" She then reads the news article out to the class and tells the students: "So, I want you to try to map out what the conflict is./ ... /Which articles are problematic or ... spark conflicts? And discuss the pros and cons." The students then discuss how they can best map out the conflicts and find that two of the Articles in the Declaration have been criticized (Articles 26 and 28). At the end of the lesson Alice returns to the question of conflict:

**Box 1.** Example of the intellectual aspect in practice.

**Alice**: Alright folks. OK. What is the conflict about do you think? What is the conflict? **Duha**: The indigenous people are not getting what they deserve.

**Alice**: Mm. Discrimination. And this is true. I mean, if you look at this population in comparison to the general population, generally speaking, indigenous peoples have a lower life expectancy, poorer health ... don't have equal access to health care, or education. They are marginalized in many, many ways, which is true.

**Elaine**: But I guess the problem is that ... . I think they want to compensate the indigenous people, but then who decides what kind of compensation is right, how much, and to who? Like who is ... **Alice**: Yes. *Who are the indigenous people*? We were talking about it here in this classroom. What does it really *mean*?

**Elaine**: Who is supposed to get compensation? And also, if they want their land back then they're asking the US to take land from someone else and give it back to them. Basically, they are saying that what they did a long time ago was wrong. So, it's a little bit like ... I understand *why* they should have that land, but as it was so long ago, it's also a little bit ... Like you can't really punish me for what my grandfather did. But I'm not saying that they shouldn't be compensated. Obviously, they should.

**Alice**: Mm. But the problem here is ... We will come to that when we get to the individual articles. Have I overlooked any of the points that you addressed? Like, can you punish landowners today for the sins of the past? Whose land is it? Can you take land and say "OK, you guys, you don't have enough, you guys have enough?" Who are the indigenous peoples? Which group are we talking about? What is their definition? I mean, should we read the actual Declaration to see what it doesn't say. It just launches straight into "The indigenous peoples have the following rights". But of course, it is sad. We are meant *to do something* about historical injustices, right? I mean, we won't have a sustainable society if we don't address these imbalances, if we don't do something. /... /

**Elaine**: But then what if the indigenous people don't think it's enough? How will they be compensated, if not with land? With money? Or some other rights? It's like ... I think that saying that they deserve compensation just brings up hundreds more questions to be answered.

**Alice**: Yes. It's a super complex issue. But on the other hand, if you don't address these imbalances ...

**Millie**: Then they will not be addressed . . .

**Alice**: Yes. That means a risk to the status quo as well. Maybe. Yes.

**Millie**: Yes. I was just going to say the minority of the country, they don't ... they can't really fight for themselves. Let's be honest. They can't really fight for themselves, so I don't really think ... They're going of course to demand more. I think almost everyone will demand more, but I don't think anyone would care about the amount. So, this doesn't really . . .

In the sequence in Box 1 the students explore the meaning of "indigenous" and try out different definitions based on a certain content presented to them by their teacher. The excerpt gives examples of how students can position themselves to the knowledge they have acquired ethically ("indigenous people are not getting what they deserve"), epistemically ("I understand why they should have that land, but as it was so long ago, it's also a little bit ... Like you can't really punish me for what my grandfather did") and

politically ("Let's be honest. They can't really fight for themselves"). It is important to notice here that the ways in which the students position themselves are interconnected. Not only does Alice guide the students towards a body of (intellectual) knowledge that they need to understand (indigenous rights, land ownership etc.), she also points to a moral problem and brings this intellectual knowledge into relation with an ethical dimension where the students need to consider right and wrong, good and evil. For Elaine, this starts a process of inquiry as she gets involved in reflections on moral issues.

#### *8.2. The Emotional Aspect in Practice*

In the situation referred to above there are no obvious emotional responses. The emotional aspect is more salient in the subsequent example (Box 2). Here, the same teacher and group of students discuss and research the difference between a state and a nation, where the question of belonging evokes strong reactions.

**Box 2.** Example of the emotional aspect in practice.


In staging this discussion, the teacher, Alice, deliberately evokes students' emotions yet also "picks up" emotional responses and offers guidance. These emotions have both moral and political implications for the specific understanding of the situation and the question of belonging. In the above example, the student Duha spontaneously reacts to Alice's description of feelings of unity and a common culture that includes a moral obligation to her (Islamic) culture. This involves Duha's emotional response to the politics of belonging, the difference between cultural identity, or the feeling of belonging to a group and having country citizenship. Based on Alice's response, Duha questions her own standpoint, which makes it possible to discern how morals are involved in the situation and in the interplay with others. Alice shows that these emotional responses are accepted and makes them part of a shared experience. By setting the scene in this way she deepens the students' processes of inquiry and supports the idea that even though the students' emotions may not always be possible to explain or defend by rational argument, they are legitimate and important ("This is a feeling of unity. You belong to a nation, and nobody can argue with that, you know. That is *your* perception of something"). At the end of the excerpt, Alice takes a meta-perspective on what it means to feel unity and belong to a nation and encourages the students to reflect on their own and others' moral experiences, formulate and consider arguments of their position and test their validity in their social contexts.

The sequence in Box 2 exposes the important role that emotions can play in students' discussions. It shows how students create emotional relations to global politics and how these relations lead to the students taking a stand on a certain issue. Furthermore, it is an example of how a teacher can use emotions as a driving force in students' inquiries and support their development of a sustainability commitment.

#### *8.3. The Practical Aspect in Practice*

The practical aspect refers to activities and actions that make encounters with the reality outside the classroom possible, i.e., actually doing something and trying to make a change in a sustainable direction. This aspect is here exemplified by a group of students and their teachers working with entrepreneurship as an extra-curricular activity (year 11, Business Management and Economics Program) as part of an exchange/school visit program between Sweden and Tanzania. The purpose of the visit was for the Swedish students to run workshops and offer the Tanzanian students the opportunity to train and develop their creativity and entrepreneurship by working on sustainable innovations and business ideas, and creating a business plan. These activities were central to the exchange program. After the visit, the Swedish students shared their experiences, feelings, and images with other students at their own school.

After the visit, one of the participating teachers and a group of three students were interviewed. The teacher Peter was asked about what he thought the students had learned from the exchange (Box 3).

**Box 3.** Example of the practical aspect in practice.

**Peter**: I believe they have learned a lot. And to be honest, I don't think it's about a certain content knowledge or whatever, but more about humanity/humanness and the emotions related to that. Also that they discovered new sides of themselves ... That is perhaps what they learned the most ... At least when we have talked about it afterwards. Like, "I didn't think I would react in that way", or "This has made me interested in ... ", things like that/ ... /I think that they would probably say a personal change . . .

In the excerpt in Box 4 the students are asked to compare their experiences from the visit with what they have learned in subjects such as the social- and natural sciences.

**Box 4.** Example of the practical aspect in practice.

**Thomas**: You can try to read about different things, about poverty, about how economies and executive boards and societies work, but you will never be able to connect at an emotional level to what you have been through. If you've been there and experienced it for yourself ... it's like ... You will never be able to understand this seed, this core of how it works if you haven't been there

**Tilda**: I mean we have all taken part in the education about extreme poverty and what it's like to live below the poverty line, but you will never be able to really understand it until you have been there yourself and seen it from your own perspective. Or I mean, yeah, before you are actually there. It's so incomprehensible because it's so different to your own daily life. And that is why it is so hard. It is so hard to grasp from a lesson compared to what it's like in reality.

This example highlights the importance of practical activities that make it possible for students to engage in real problems and interact directly with others. The responses of the teacher and the students reveal how the study visit made the students clarify, rethink and sometimes re-formulate their own values (and actions). The excerpts show how learning through these activities involves and is intimately connected with emotions ("I believe they have learned a lot ... about humanity/humanness and emotions related to that") and intellectual insights ("You will never be able to really understand it until you have been there yourself and seen it from your own perspective"). The excerpts also point to the moments when we "take in" the world in its difference. Taking in difference in a concrete and practical context affects these students deeply in a way that is transformative and allows them to gain new insights and deepen their sustainability commitment.

#### **9. Discussion**

...

The purpose of this article has been to propose a model that describes and frames a sustainability commitment and while providing a critical perspective on ESE practice offering a framework for selecting content and methods when teaching sustainability issues. Using a retroductive method, we have developed this model through an interplay between Nordic and German didactic theory, John Dewey's pragmatic philosophy, and several empirical studies on ESE practice.

The model suggests that sustainability commitment should be a common goal for ESE and that a sound commitment is situated at the intersection of the intellectual, emotional, and practical aspects of sustainability (Figure 3). The relationship between these aspects is reciprocal. If one or two of the aspects are missing, or if there is an imbalance between them, the commitment risks being misleading or vague.

The intellectual aspect is essential for giving the commitment scientific rigor and a critical stance. A sustainability engagement based on emotions may lack critical intellectual insights derived from e.g., postcolonial and decolonial studies. Such an engagement could run the risk of naïve activities characterized by "salvationism" and "ahistoricism", i.e., activities that portray other people as being in need or frame help as a burden of the fittest and thus fail to take the historical past of oppression and exploitation into account [48–50,75]. Without a critical perspective, there is a risk that the political and ethical nature of sustainability issues will be hidden. An educational approach that assumes a form of consensus on sustainable development overlooks the fact that power relations are constitutive of the social and that conflict and antagonism cannot be eradicated [60]. It is, therefore, essential to integrate critical perspectives into the learning process and in this way develop students' competence to identify and analyze ethical and political tensions and provide them with tools to handle conflicts in constructive ways.

On the other hand, if there is a lack of emotional involvement in sustainability issues, they become detached from the person. The actions may be reflected activities but there is no driving force for change. As shown by Ojala [59], when treated in the right way, emotions such as hope and fear are essential if students are to become dedicated and actually want to do something.

**Figure 3.** Sustainability commitment as the intersection between intellectual, emotional, and practical aspects.

Apart from knowledge about the world, it is also important for the intellectual aspect to include inquiries into the students' own epistemic, ethical, and political positions in relation to this knowledge. If this is missing, sustainability issues may become distant issues that do not relate to the students' lives and concerns. Together, the intellectual and emotional aspect can create an "emotional reflexivity"—a personal engagement anchored in scientific knowledge and ethical and political insights. This can be seen as a reflective approach that could start a careful examination of the collective "root" narratives that we are a part of and where such understandings come from [49,76].

To play a more active role in providing a sustainable transformation of society, it is also necessary to be knowledgeable about appropriate and effective actions for change and have the willingness, confidence and skills to carry them out [25]. However, an action is not just a physical activity, but also involves deciding what to do through a problem-solving process [23]. The practical is thus an indispensable part of a sustainability commitment, although too much emphasis on this may turn ESE into "solutionism" and "instrumentalism". There is therefore a danger that teachers who are attached to actions may get caught up with "doing something" and finding solutions to ongoing or emerging sustainability challenges. However, as Jensen and Schnack [23] put it: "the task is not to solve the problems of the world by 'using' the pupils" (p. 484).

Although a sustainability commitment is a common goal, we claim that the results of the students' inquiries should be an open question, in line with a pluralistic approach to ESE [37], i.e., the ethical and political standpoint on sustainability issues should be the individual student's concern. The role of the teacher is to support the development of a deep engagement anchored in scientific knowledge through a critical inquiry into different alternatives without privileging a specific opinion. If we believe in a democratic transformation towards a sustainable society, we should allow for a plurality of standpoints in schools. However, then again, an over-focus on a concern with a plurality of perspectives without a critical approach could mean that a sustainability commitment misses the point.

In relation to previous significant attempts to define the content of sustainability awareness and interest, such as the key competence approach [14,15,17] and the action competence approach [23], we have considered the question from a didactic point of view. We have put teaching practice and the learning process in the foreground and asked ourselves how meaningful competencies can be fostered. We also agree with Shephard et al. [77] who have raised concerns about the usefulness of the terms "competence" and "capability". They highlight that existing frameworks all too often fail to distinguish between the outcomes that students are expected to achieve and their motivation to enact them, and the pedagogical approaches designed to achieve them. These authors conclude that outcomes as competencies or capabilities "that fail to describe in educational terms the pedagogical imperatives of engagement and of assurance of learning, are unlikely to help the mission of ESD" (p. 544). Similarly, Vare et al. [78] points to the risk that an all too detailed qualification template run the risk to "atomize learning in a way that runs counter to the holistic principles of sustainability" (p. 1).

Furthermore, we have provided a theoretical basis in didactic theory and Dewey's pragmatism and developed the suggested model in an interplay with empirical studies of ongoing practice. We have presented a structure that shows how the different components of a commitment are interconnected and are not simply competencies that people should "have" to solve sustainability problems. The action competence approach [23] has contributed important normative perspectives on what competence and action can and should mean in educational practice. The focus of this approach lies mostly on how knowledge about sustainability issues can be transformed into an actionable phase and how actions can contribute to change. In relation to this educational ideal, we have developed a holistic model for the content of a sustainability commitment that describes how actions relate to students' intellectual understandings of and emotional responses to sustainability issues. It is our hope that these additions will help teachers to organize students' inquiries into sustainability issues in a more meaningful way.

In this article, we have only touched on the essential didactic question of how—the best methods for teaching for a sustainability commitment. Furthermore, we have mostly argued for the different components of sustainability commitment, but have to a lesser extent stressed the depth of students' knowledge, awareness, and skills that is required for them to qualify as sustainability citizens, who in Arjen Wals' words are "able to interrogate resilient unsustainability and who can participate in the co-creation of new systems and associated routines that appear, at least for the moment, more sustainable than the ones in need of replacement" [19] (p. 34). What we therefore would like to encourage is further didactic research that deepens the knowledge about the relation between certain teaching efforts and students' development of a sustainability commitment. Presently, too much of this research consists of occasional dives into classroom practice, where far-reaching conclusions are drawn from single lessons. What we think is required here is longitudinal studies covering the interplay between teaching and students' development over several years, combined with in-depth interviews to determine how young people reason about, feel about, and value the urgent, complex, and severe sustainability challenges that we are facing today.

**Author Contributions:** J.Ö. and L.S. have together developed the theoretical model, conceived and designed the study, analyzed the data, and written the paper. Both authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

**Funding:** This research was funded by the Swedish Research Council, grant number 2017-03468.

**Informed Consent Statement:** Informed consent was obtained from all subjects involved in the study.

**Data Availability Statement:** Data available on request due to ethical restrictions. The data presented in this study can be available on request from the corresponding author.

**Conflicts of Interest:** The authors declare no conflict of interest.

#### **References**


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