Perceived Affordances, Tensions, and Complementarities in the Physical and Digital Environments Frequented by Future Teachers

Abstract

Is future teachers’ contact with the physical environment significant enough for them to choose to educate their students about sustainability? These digital natives stand out from previous generations by their way of living. The research based on grounded theory was aimed at understanding future teachers’ relationships with physical and technological environments. The analysis of interviews, with Moncton and Montreal teacher education students, reveals that future teachers maintain a sporadic relation to the natural environment. They are still conscious that nature provides them calmness, rejuvenation and beauty. The Internet offers them distraction, social affiliation, personalized information, and facilitates their tasks and contact with the World. Future teachers are critical and cautious in their use of ICT but are however not much involved in the environmental cause. The research emphasizes the need to work on future teachers’ relationship to the physical environment with outdoor activities to get to know, appreciate, analyze and improve the natural and urban environments.