Children’s Three Voices: An Exploration of Indian Students’ Meaning-Making of Nature & Place

Abstract

The study uses Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis to explore five Indian children’s meaning-making of nature and place during two environmental education programs. Data consisted of structured interviews, semi-structured group discussion, written assignments, and student-authored storybooks. The results show that children's encounters with nature led to fascination, a sense of peace and belonging, gratitude, and love. The sense of merging identities engendered feelings of protectiveness and anger at human actions. Children amplified their meaning-making by authoring storybooks on nature. The results reinforce theoretical and other empirical work on the process of nature and place connectedness but add to sparse research on the meaning-making of nature by Indian children through an examination of their own voices. Furthermore, they explore the integration of children’s meaning-making embedded in place and nature. Lastly, the research highlights how the dynamics of meaning-making and connectedness fuel children’s environmental activism.



Author Information
Aneesa Jamal, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Malaysia
Sanitah Yusof, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Malaysia
Naqeeb Sultana, Tamil Nadu Teachers Education University, India

Paper Information
Conference: ACE2022
Stream: Learning Experiences

This paper is part of the ACE2022 Conference Proceedings (View)
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To cite this article:
Jamal A., Yusof S., & Sultana N. (2023) Children’s Three Voices: An Exploration of Indian Students’ Meaning-Making of Nature & Place ISSN: 2186-5892 The Asian Conference on Education 2022: Official Conference Proceedings https://doi.org/10.22492/issn.2186-5892.2023.10
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.22492/issn.2186-5892.2023.10


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Posted by James Alexander Gordon