Using Online Educational Technology to Teach Sustainable Development

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Using Online Educational Technologyto Teach
Sustainable Development
Global 500 Asia Pacific Forum
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• The marriage of technology with creative
  education has produced a fantastic tool for the
  world. With the advent of the Internet we have
  an opportunity to teach sustainable development
  to a huge audience of childrena global audience.

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• Together, technology and education will allow use
  to bring forth a new generation of
  environmentalists. Students will become global
  citizens as they learn from the best libraries,
  museums and information archives in the world.
  Internet technology can and will provide the
  forum to teach sustainable development to an
  entire generation.

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• Technology can spark childrens natural curiosity
  and direct their enthusiasm for learning in ways
  that help them mature and engage meaningfully in
  the world around them.

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• In 1994, Laurel Springs School (1991 Laureate)
  developed the first Web-based curriculum. Today,
  over 53,000 children in 39 countries are using
  our program and our curriculum has been
  translated into Japanese. We have discovered
  that online education can change the face of
  learning and is the ideal tool to teach
  environmental principals.

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• Here is an example of how online educational
  technology lends itself to studies about the
  environment. This lesson from Kids4Earth, an
  online environmental studies course for children
  ages 10 13, highlights some heroic efforts of
  children.

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• In this lesson, 1999 Global 500 Laureate Kruti
  Parekh uses earthworms to convert garbage into
  organic fertilizer. Kruti has involved 100
  schools in the city of Mumbai (present-day
  Bombay) in environmental activities. She has
  created a vermiculture pit in Bal Bhavan, which
  uses earthworms to turn ordinary garbage into
  rich, organic soil. And she has also put
  vermiculture into practice at her homea temple
  in Mumbaiwhere monthly waste can weigh more than
  one ton!

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• There is another component to online education
  that must be taken into consideration The
  importance of nurturing creative thought. We
  want our young people to be independent thinkers,
  active learners, multifaceted individuals and
  effective communicators. We want children to
  become the next generation of environmentalists
  who can also think outside of the box. We want
  students who are well versed in theory, but can
  put their ideas into actions.

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• Perhaps they will be the next bio-engineers who
  will create technologies never conceived of
  before. Biotechnology has allowed us to use
  present resources to enhance and protect our
  environment. Biotechnology was successfully
  employed to assist in the Exxon Valdez oil spill
  where clean-up through normal means was
  impossible. The oil could not be contained or
  successfully collected and it certainly couldnt
  be burned. Therefore, oil-eating ameba were
  dispatched to the clean up the area.

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• Biotechnology requires creative thinking, and
  creative thinking requires creative education.
  Creative thinking starts early.
• Here is a beautiful excerpt from an essay written
  by a 12-year-old Ari van der Burgh, after she was
  asked to write a Declaration of Interdependence
  for her 8th grade environmental studies class

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• As a global village where the actions of even a
  few can affect the whole of mankind, let us all
  resolve to change our ways and to think
  differently. Let us resolve to bring pressure on
  our governments to work for a balance between the
  needs of mankind and the need to protect our
  environment. Let each of us resolve to conserve
  as much as we can. Let us resolve to bring
  change by not supporting industries or countries
  that refuse to participate in our world
  responsibly. Let us resolve to unite and demand
  respect for nature, in the realization that it is
  essential to our survival. Let us resolve not to
  be selfish and strive to leave a decent
  environment for our children and future
  descendants.

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• In closing, the marriage of technology with
  creative education allows us to
• ? Educate children to accept their responsibility
  as stewards of this planet.
• Educate them to become independent thinkers,
  active learners and effective communicators.
• Educate children to think creatively so they can
  expand their minds to use and adapt technology to
  work for them and their planet instead of
  against.
• Educate students to go beyond the status quo and
  empower them to know they can make a difference.

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The End
Global 500 Asia Pacific Forum