Curriculum Concepts from CELF Summer Institutes
CELF has conducted nine Summer Institute for Sustainability Education programs since 2005, working with over 30 public and private schools and over 350 teachers and administrators through this program alone.
The Institute has attracted teams of teachers from California, Massachusetts, Arkansas, Connecticut and New Jersey, as well as New York. Most participants hail from schools in Westchester County, NY where CELF has trained faculty from dozens of schools in curriculum and programming in education for sustainability.
The 2009 Summer Institute featured two sessions: one for middle and high school teachers and one for K-5 teachers. Both met in beautiful and historic Reid Castle on the campus of our partner, Manhattanville College School of Education in Purchase, NY.
The chart below provides examples of the kinds of curriculum “makeovers” that individual teachers have developed during the Summer Institute. Larger scale projects, such as multi-grade level, scaffolded interdisciplinary curriculum maps and integrated units have been created by school teams. For example, at the 2009 Institute, a team from New Rochelle High School developed a high school level Sustainability Major – a four-year course of study.
Selected Curriculum Concepts Developed by CELF Summer Institute Participants
Grade Level / Subject: |
Curriculum Concept: |
High School Interdisciplinary Major |
An interdisciplinary team of teachers created a four-year scope and sequence for a sustainability major that serves as a thread through existing courses and electives. The major begins with the integration of sustainability into required courses, and also offers specialized electives. The program is structured in the following “layers”:
|
4th grade English: fiction-reading unit |
Make sustainability the overarching focus of the unit, adding more literature with that theme, including eco-mysteries from Jean Craighead George; Seedfolks by Paul Fleischman; and The Year of the Panda by Miriam Schlein. |
5th grade computer instruction |
Teach Excel formulas and graphing using a home energy audit and calculating watts, kilowatts, energy costs and carbon footprints |
7th and 8th grade social studies |
Research Easter Island as a context for understanding systems dynamics, the Commons and the multiple causes and impacts of its collapse. |
7th and 8th grade math |
Use algebra and graphing to calculate depletion rates of oil; calculate BTUs to analyze energy conservation opportunities. |
High school music theory |
Explore why rare woods are valued in making instruments and how they are being depleted; long-term thinking and caring for instruments so they will last. |
High school chemistry |
Explore local bodies of water and factors that impact water quality. |
“At the early stages of construction, CELF encouraged us to capitalize on learning opportunities related to our new green building. We continue to work together to identify and build into our curriculum lasting, meaningful content that will support sustainability as a cornerstone of learning at Gateway.”
Robert Cunningham, EdM
Gateway Headmaster
New York, NY
“At the beginning of the week I wasn’t sure how this was going to fit. But as we got more into it, I started seeing connections. The more we talked about things and the more we did activities, I saw more ways to infuse sustainability concepts and thinking into my curriculum.”
9th grade English Teacher
Riverside High School
Yonkers, NY
“We intend to do every thing in our power to encourage education for sustainability. Education for sustainability is not just about the environment, as important as that is. It is also about people – about providing the maximum educational opportunity – at every level to every person."
Arne Duncan
U.S. Secretary of Education
March 2009