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Teacher Training Programme
While the biodiversity work we do with young people in our region is having a significant positive impact on schools and communities, we recognise that to entrench awareness and commitment to environmental conservation, we have to partner with educators. To this end, since 2009 Lapalala Wilderness School runs numerous three-day educator workshops to promote the importance of integrating environmental learning into the school curriculum.
The programme focuses on guiding and helping educators from disadvantaged schools in both the rural and urban environments of Limpopo and Gauteng on the ways in which to bring EE into their classrooms in an engaging and effective way. Each workshop caters for between 20 and 30 educators, and a number of representatives from the Departments of Education in Gauteng and Limpopo have also attended.
Our effort in this regard supports the CAPS+ Approach curriculum by demonstrating to educators that many environmental topics can be woven into a variety of subjects and lend themselves to furthering education for sustainable development.
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The main objectives of the Teacher Training Programme are as follows:
- To expose educators to EE programmes and highlight the importance of including EE in the ‘mainstream’ school curriculum.
- To aid educators with the integration of environmental learning into lesson plans and the CAPS+ curriculum.
- To increase the level of confidence in educators around their ability to teach their learners on environmental topics.
- To workshop and explore environmental issues, challenges and solutions within the educators’ own schools and communities.
- To encourage the implementation of action projects by educators to improve their school environments (e.g. permaculture gardens).
- To promotion environmental projects that are endorsed by the Department of Education.
