Research Information System
The 17th Asian Conference on Education (ACE2025), Tokyo, Japan, 23 - 28 November 2025, pp.180, (Summary Text)
The degradation of ecosystems due to human activities, alongside biodiversity loss and climate change, has made green transformation and sustainable development critical priorities in education. Despite increasing awareness, current educational initiatives remain inadequate in addressing the root causes of these crises and fostering transformative societal change. Ecopedagogy, grounded in critical pedagogy, presents an alternative educational paradigm that emphasizes respect for both humans and nature, aiming to support a sustainable future. Integrating ecopedagogy into educational policies and teaching practices can enhance sustainability across environmental, social, economic, and cultural dimensions. In this regard, teachers are expected to possess specific competencies aligned with ecopedagogical principles. However, the literature lacks a clear consensus on the knowledge, skills, and attitudes teachers should demonstrate in this context. This study seeks to identify the sub-dimensions of ecopedagogy and the associated teacher competencies through a qualitative research design. Semi-structured interviews are being conducted with approximately 25 experts from various countries. The data are being analyzed using thematic analysis. Preliminary results indicate that expert views cluster around four main categories: the transformative role of education in sustainability, education for ecological sustainability, sub-dimensions of ecopedagogy, and teacher competencies in terms of knowledge, skills, and attitudes. The results of the study is expected to contribute to identifying the necessary teacher competencies for the effective implementation of ecopedagogy. These insights may shed light on the teacher competency frameworks, the development of ecopedagogical teacher competency scales, the development of curricula for initial and in-service teacher education, and future education policies that support sustainability.