**2. Literature review**

The South African education system has frequently changed since gaining independence in 1994 resulting in the curriculum change that was problematic in its implementation. These challenges were caused by the complexity of the implementation programme and the capacity of teachers to adopt new teaching strategies in the classroom. The curriculum has undergone multiple variations, from Curriculum 2005 (C2005) to the Revised National Curriculum Statement (RNCS), to the National Curriculum Statement (NCS) Grade R–12, and then, in 2011 to the Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statements, commonly known as CAPS.

The transformation of the curriculum in South Africa focused on the content, teaching methods and assessment [8].

#### **2.1 Importance of EE/ESD coverage in the curriculum**

Currently, the Earth is in the Anthropocene era where human-derived environmental crises have taken centre stage due to their global extent to the point that they can no longer be avoided. Our impact on the environment is threatening not only biodiversity but also the very existence of humankind itself. Climate change and global warming are recent phenomena that were not part of the curriculum in the past, yet we are already feeling the effects of climate change locally and globally. Therefore, it is against this background that environmental impact topics need to be sufficiently covered in the curriculum, in teaching and learning processes and in examinations to ensure that values and principles of sustainable development are encouraged. Natural resources are important to every living organism, and they should be utilised without being depleted to satisfy human livelihood. Unsustainable human exploitation of natural resources, pollution and degradation result in negative environmental impacts that consequently have negative implications on biodiversity, ecosystems, the physical environment and, subsequently, human development and livelihood sustenance. For this reason, it is important to ensure that environmental impact topics are sufficiently covered in the curriculum [9].

Moreover, since the Industrial Revolution, the rapid development of society has resulted in many global environmental problems such as global warming, a rise in sea levels, ozone depletion, air and water pollution, land degradation, destruction of wetlands and deforestation [10–12]. These environmental problems outlined above can be partially addressed through a school curriculum that includes a consideration of environmental impact topics across all levels from policy to implementation. Therefore, teaching of environmental impact topics through EE/ESD and its alignment to curriculum policies is the focus of this study.

The efficient utilisation of the world's natural resources is one of the important themes of AGENDA 21, "A global action plan for environmental impacts into the 21st century" [13]. The precious natural resources of the planet are being depleted and degraded at a rapid rate. Sitarz notes that the Earth's limited supply of natural resources and its inability to recover from degradation were not taken seriously in the past [14]. The rapid increase in population and the accompanying human activities in the last century have placed extreme stress on environmental resources. As a result, Hill et al. [9] point out that, in 1993, a National Environmental and Planning Agency was formed in some European countries to promote EE/ESD activities through environmental impact programmes. In South Africa, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) play an important role in ensuring that the ruling government upholds EE/ ESD where, in 1975 for example, the Umgeni Valley Project encouraged the development of EE/ESD practice and theory in the country [15].

It is generally accepted that there are limits to both the Earth's resources and its capacity to handle the environmental impacts caused by humans [14]. Thomas-Hope reveals, for instance, that the environmental impacts of solid waste which is disposed of at landfills and cannot cope with such disposal contribute greatly to land degradation [16]. This human activity is evident in the global arena where the effects of cumulative negative environmental impacts on the environment are experienced. In addition, [12] emphasises that human activity is a factor that has important impact on the environment, even in remote areas, since the onset of the Holocene era. Goudie and Viles further argue that it normally takes some time for the causes of

environmental impacts to become apparent and this makes the causes hard to identify [17]. They also associate environmental changes with human impacts which go together with natural fluctuations to create massive and unpredictable changes in the environment.

Against this background, it is essential that the global resources of land, freshwater, marine, biological, genetic resources and energy are protected [14]. Human development must be achieved in a way that improves productivity to meet global demand for goods and services while sustaining the Earth's natural resources. Educating future generations is important to expose them to environmental issues that are detrimental to the environment, which sustains human existence. Depletion of natural resources through unsustainable resource extraction has often been associated with population growth, which was estimated to have reached 7.9 billion people globally by 2022 [18]. Population growth and development can lead to violence since people affected by shortages of natural resources believe that they are unfairly treated in the distribution of basic needs such as food [19].

#### **2.2 Environmental content aspects in the curriculum**

As mentioned earlier in this chapter, local, regional and global environments are being gradually degraded by mostly human-induced (manmade) as well as nonhuman induced activities. Therefore, it is important to perform research about the coverage of environmental impacts in the curriculum due to the continued lack of realisation of the unsustainability of human actions on the environment and their implications on human livelihood. Hence, it is important to respond to these environmental impacts through education, which should incorporate EE/ESD themes in the curriculum and across all subjects. Coverage of environmental impact topics in the South African school curriculum should be accessible to the younger generations who will have informed knowledge on how they could preserve resources for future usage by acquainting themselves with environmental knowledge embedded in the documents. Therefore, documents such as Grade 12 textbooks, examination papers and CAPS must be aligned to important practices that aim at EE/ESD. This study aims to provide an assessment of what is being projected by policy on environmental education and what is being practised in the Geography subject.

Carvello in her study of an assessment of the role of eco-schools in achieving whole school development through sustainability education highlighted some evidence of EE/ESD in the NCS in subjects such as Business studies, Consumer studies, Life Orientation, Agricultural Sciences, Tourism, Mechanical Technology and Economics [20]. Carvello study was done before the CAPS curriculum was implemented and does not analyse the alignment between policy and practice [20]. On the other hand, [21] in her study of an investigation into issues and challenges in implementing environmental education in special schools in South Africa, states that the constant changing of the curriculum in a very short period confuses teachers. Her findings point to a situation where teachers are unable to cope with the changes that have been affected in the curriculum. Similarly, [7] points out that South African teachers are frustrated by curriculum policy changes, where teachers indicated that since 1994 there have been many curriculum changes where some policies have been repealed before they could be implemented.

In addition, [21] study further reveals that teacher's views about the environment are very superficial, and they confuse EE/ESD with nature studies or nature conservation, which influences the way they teach. Furthermore, [7] reveals that teachers

### *Effects of the Changes of Curriculum on the Coverage of Environmental Content in Geography DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.104988*

indicated that they find it difficult to integrate EE into the curriculum because they were not fully trained on how they could use EE concepts in the classroom. Zwelibanzi [21] is of the opinion that an exploratory study could be conducted on how to enhance teacher's pedagogical and content knowledge regarding EE through in-service and pre-service training. She further recommends that survey studies should be conducted on teacher's knowledge and perceptions about constructivism that underpins CAPS. Some studies provided important findings of the integration of EE/ESD in the school curriculum, teachers' discourse, practices, political, economic and social dimensions of EE, different EE approaches, environmental behavioural changes, pre-service teacher training and assessing environmental competency [22–25].

When reviewing literature on EE/ESD in South Africa, most of the studies conducted research on integration, teacher practices, pedagogical and content knowledge, different EE approaches, behavioural changes and assessing environmental literacy [7, 20, 21]. However, none of the studies was about the alignment and extent of EE/ESD coverage in curriculum policy and in the examinations. It is against this background that this study analysed the coverage, teaching and examinations of environmental impact topics in the FET curriculum. In addition, this study analysed how the shift of the curriculum has affected coverage of EE/ESD topics.

The approaches used in South Africa to include ESD in the curriculum are an issuesbased approach and a fragmented approach [26]. The extent and depth of coverage of ESD content in the curriculum is dependent on the subject. Some subjects have greater coverage of environmental content than others do [26]. However, the Curriculum Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS) requires teachers to integrate aspects of environment and sustainable development into almost all subjects as seen in **Table 1** for example.

According to the UNESCO Global Action Programme on Education for Sustainable Development, ten SADC countries experienced challenges in integrating and implementing EE/ESD in teacher education. These challenges were:


#### **2.3 Teaching EE/ESD topics in selected countries**

This section shows overview of EE/ESD in selected countries. These countries were selected to show how other countries apart from South Africa EE/ESD is integrated into the curriculum.

#### *2.3.1 Taiwan*

According to [27], curricula and teaching methods adopted by elementary and junior high schools in Taiwan affected the outcomes of EE. Yang gives the following


#### **Table 1.**

*Mapping some of the key EE/ESD knowledge areas/themes in the south African school curriculum.*

example: at elementary schools, social science and nature and life technology textbooks typically contain and mention nature and environmental issues but fail to teach much beyond natural aesthetic appreciation. Lessons typically focus on students' semantic analysis and rhetoric skills, and the teachers are more concerned with the appreciation of poetry. Yang [27] remarks that the Chinese use nature to understand the beauty of literature, and do not pay attention to nature itself. In Taiwan, social studies, nature and life technology involve a large coverage of geographic and natural environmental content, yet this content is based on knowledge without any real appreciation of environmental issues and rather focuses on the aesthetics of nature. Yang [27] argues that although elementary school learners do not experience substantial academic pressure, environmental awareness cannot be achieved solely by studying the written content of teaching materials.

#### *2.3.2 New Zealand*

Irwin and [28] recognise that currently, there is no curriculum requirement to teach EE in Aotearoa, New Zealand. They admit, however, that it is entirely at the discretion of individual schools and their school governing bodies to incorporate EE in their curriculum, although the environmental guidelines recommend using a wholeschool approach across multiple learning areas. They indicate that while EE operates both within and outside of the national curriculum. This is done because the vision

and future focus of the curriculum requires all subjects to integrate key socio-cultural and environmental aspects relating to sustainability into the learning process [28].

#### *2.3.3 Australian*

'Education for sustainability develops the knowledge, skills, values and worldview necessary for people to act in ways that contribute to more sustainable patterns of living' [29]. In Australia, there is an increased emphasis on sustainability in education supported by a series of government initiatives, policy statements and whole school programmes. This has led to environmental impact topics being embedded in all school learning areas [29]. The increase of environmental impact topics in the curriculum has presented challenges in efficacy and content knowledge.

#### *2.3.4 Namibian*

EE in the Namibian curriculum is embedded in all subjects. According to [30] study, environmental learning is integrated across the curriculum where incorporating environmental topics requires knowledgeable teachers to relate these topics to the environment. This is a similar case in South Africa where EE is embedded across the subjects in the curriculum. The analysis of Namibian inclusion of EE in the curriculum revealed that more emphasis is on the Biology syllabus. This is almost the same scenario in South Africa where more emphasis of EE is in Life Sciences.

#### *2.3.5 Zimbabwe*

In 1999, the Presidential inquiry into education and training recommended the integration of EE into the school curriculum [31]. This led to EE being developed to influence policy, which then led to the integration of EE in all learning institutions at various levels in the formal and non-formal sector [32]. In the curriculum of Zimbabwe, EE is done in carrier subjects such as Natural Science, which covers only the biophysical aspect of the environment. Curriculum greening was then suggested as one of the platforms that can be used to disseminate EE across the curriculum [32].

#### *2.3.6 Botswana*

In Botswana, EE integration in the curriculum traverse's subject boundaries, thus allowing teachers to collaborate on cross-syllabi content [33]. Subjects in the curriculum are interconnected with the intent of infusing integration in the development of schoolchildren's concept of EE [33]. Despite government efforts for curricular integration, it is the responsibility of the teachers to integrate environmental content in their classrooms. Against this background, integration of EE in Botswana is implemented across all school subjects. Velempini [33] mentions that there is misalignment and continuing confusion on what the policy stipulates and how implementation is accomplished in schools.

#### *2.3.7 Zambia*

In Zambia, EE is covered in the lower, middle, and upper basics of the schooling system. EE is covered mostly in subjects such as Geography, History, Social Studies and Religious Education [34]. According to [34], EE is covered as components in the various subjects and that has implications on teacher competence because there are no experts specifically trained in EE as a discipline.
