Our world, our futures: a dialogic approach to environmental literacy and global citizenship education in primary schools in the Maldives and England

Abstract

Environmental literacy and global citizenship education (GCE) are necessary to the development of a fairer, more peaceful and more sustainable world, but teachers frequently lack practical examples of their implementation in the classroom. This article presents =Our World, Our Futures, a collaboration between researchers, primary school teachers and children (7–12 years) from the Maldives and England. Its aims were (1) to develop a cross- cultural, dialogic approach to environmental literacy and GCE through cross- curricular and art projects in which students shared their local environmental knowledges and interests with overseas peers; (2) to explore the projects' impacts on students' environmental knowledge, intercultural understanding and solidarity and global citizenship and (3) to examine teachers' responses to the projects and the effects on their professional development. Employing a qualitative methodology informed by teacher- research and ethnography, data collection included classroom observations, interviews and collection of artworks. Findings suggest that students gained insights into their peers' and their own environments, a sense of global and more- than- human interconnectedness, and a desire to contribute to positive change in their local communities and the wider world. Teachers reported increased confidence in employing flexible, dialogic approaches to environmental literacy and GCE, describing the projects as empowering for pupils. Findings highlight how epistemic justice can be promoted within the primary classroom through valuing diverse knowledges and repositioning students and teachers as global citizens and co- creators of knowledge. Our World, Our Futures offers insight into the potential contribution of a cross- cultural, dialogic approach to the field of environmental literacy and global citizenship education as well as examples of how it might work in diverse ways in primary classrooms.