He tohu o te wā - hangarau pūtaiao/signs of our times - fusing technology with environmental sciences

Abstract

Youth of this era are more disconnected from the natural world than their predecessors. Global populations live increasingly in urban landscapes, which creates an ‘extinction of experience’ when interacting with nature. In 2018, we facilitated 8 workshops with students aged 13 to 17 from two Maori immersion schools (Wharekura) to explore the application and implementation of a cultural monitoring framework. Although initial workshops demonstrated it was possible to apply the cultural monitoring method across ecosystems, the absence of basic ecological literacy was a significant challenge. We observed that uptake and understanding of basic environmental knowledge and ecological literacy increased markedly when we used gamification. We tested the potential of technology to enable pro-environmental behaviour and increase environmental literacy and indigenous knowledge to support student’s connection to the natural world. Over the duration of this study, we developed a basic New Zealand ecology game, called Eko. The game fuses basic ecological concepts with indigenous Maori knowledge to provide a holistic view of the environment. Our survey results show that 90% of the students found our game entertaining, while 65% reported new knowledge acquisition. Our research revealed that while ‘extinction of experience’ in this area is rising globally, technology can be used as a mechanism to facilitate an increase in ecological literacy, indigenous knowledge, and pro-environmental behaviours. Our challenge in reversing the disconnection between our youth and the natural world is to explore the void between environment, technology, and indigenous knowledge. People should therefore be encouraged to explore how technological innovation can augment holistic solutions when connecting youth with their natural world.