A Closer Look into Turkish Elementary Teachers Regarding Their Beliefs on Education for Sustainable Development

Abstract

The purpose of the current study is to describe beliefs, perceived barriers and teaching strategy preference of elementary teachers with respect to education for sustainable development. The sample of research survey consisted of 211 elementary teachers who are also participant of projects on environmental education entitled Green Pack and Eco-schools. The data were collected by three different scale entitled "beliefs on education for sustainable development scale," "barriers towards education for sustainable development scale" and "techniques in education for sustainable development scale." Items of the scales were examined taking into account mean scores, standard deviation, frequencies and percentages. Results revealed that teachers perceive some of the condition such as curriculum, class size, and lack of instructional materials as barriers for education for sustainable development. Despite these barriers, teachers have favorable beliefs regarding education for sustainable development. These beliefs were in line with the standards portrayed by international reports. In addition, it was argued that teachers' beliefs may be shaped by the educational projects they participated in.