Course overview

Connecting weeks - January 27 - February 14

During Topic 1, the focus is to connect to the subject at hand, with peers and facilitators, and to form groups. You will be encouraged to share expectations, background knowledge, experience and practice and begin to build relationships.

To make sense of why learning for sustainability is important and what it entails, this topic encourages you to explore questions regarding meaning and belonging in this interconnected world. We will also explore a few central questions and differing interpretations regarding the concept of sustainability, and make visible the preconceived understanding that we all bring to a course like this.

Responsible for these weeks: Terese Thoni & Alexis Engström

Activities during connecting week

For all learners

Connecting webinar: 27 January, 13-14:30 (CET)

During the "connecting webinar", we will reflect upon connection at different levels. We will briefly introduce different ways of understanding and connecting to sustainability as a concept.

Exploring the current state of the world can trigger emotional responses. We have invited Marlis Wullenkord, Environmental Psychologist at Lund University, to talk about eco-emotions and coping strategies in educational settings.

Research on Education for Sustainability shows that to foster sustainability commitment it is not enough to know about sustainability, we also need emotional connection. We will introduce a few activities that encourage place-based reflection and connecting with the world around us that you can try yourself during this topic, if you want to, and/or with your students.

This webinar is an opportunity to meet and connect with the course community. Our aspiration is to provide a space for questions around belonging and meaning making.
Link to attend the webinar on 27 January: link for HEDS251 webinars

Recording of the webinar: Connecting to the world and each other - Topic 1 - HEDS 251 - KauPlay

Slides from the webinar including information about the discussion webinar: topic 1 presentation seminar_canvas.pdf

Discussion webinar: February 12, 13-14 (CET)

At the discussion webinar, you will get the opportunity to discuss a question of your choice that is meaningful to you and that you have reflected upon during this topic, together with participants from other PBL-groups. If you have tried one of the activities that were suggested during the connecting webinar, you can share and discuss your experience.

Link to attend the webinar on 12 February: link for HEDS251 webinars

Recording: Discussion webinar topic 1

Personal learning reflections

The personal learning reflections are an important part of your learning process. The reflections were introduced during introduction week. In order to receive a certificate for the course, you need to submit one post for each topic, including Topic 1.

Read more about personal reflections and how to get started

Course synchronous activity

Connecting webinar

Monday January 27, 13:00-14:30 (CET)

🌍 Please check your timezone

link for HEDS251 webinars

Recording: Connecting to the world and each other - Topic 1 - HEDS 251 - KauPlay

💬Discussion webinar

Wednesday February 12, 13:00-14:00 (CET)

🌍 Please check your timezone

link for HEDS251 webinars

Recording: Discussion webinar topic 1

Registered participants

Get to know each other

All registered participants will get access to their PBL group, during "Getting Started Week". You will find your PBL group space in Canvas main menu on the left, under "Groups".

The most important thing to do during Topic 1 is to meet with your group. To start off work, attend meetings and get to know each other, your expectations, and how you relate to sustainability.

Collaborative work

During this week the PBL groups will begin to form and plan for the collaborative work. It is essential that you are present and active during this important phase of forming your group work and getting to know each other!

A facilitator and a co-facilitator in each group will guide and support you and take the lead for the start-up.
You will find your PBL group space on the course home page, and the blue button "Groups".
The facilitators will have set up times for the first online group meetings. These important first meetings are about getting to know each other and to discuss how you are going to work together (“setting ground rules”).
Please note the dates and times and communicate your availability to the facilitators by responding to their post.

Checkout the FISh model
See the suggested agenda for group meetings
Check out the suggested agreement for the group
During the PBL-meetings, discuss the topic introduced during the webinar. Summarise your findings in your Group Creation.
Share your Group Creation to the wider the HEDS community by clicking "Answer" in the Connecting week discussion forum called "Group presentations" by the latest Sunday February 16.

Read about, discuss and familiarise yourself with the HEDS design and HEDS learning activities, including using the FISh model for collaborative inquiry, and select from the literature and/or activities below something that your group finds relevant in respect to the discussion from the webinar.

PBL group work

Starting a process about education and sustainability, you are reminded about difficulties in interpreting the concept of sustainable development visible in this short quote from Jickling and Wals (2002):

“…sustainability talk can, when used by advocates with radically different ideas about what should be sustained, mask central issues under the false pretense of a shared understanding, set of values and common vision of the future. However, critical thought depends on transcendent elements in ordinary language, the words and ideas that reveal assumptions and worldviews, and the tools to mediate differences between contesting value systems. And worse still, sustainability talk can lead us in the direction of Orwell’s (1989) famously satirical notion of ``doublethink’’ whereby ordinary citizens can increasingly hold in their minds contradictory meanings for the same term and accept them both (Orwell, 1989, p. 223)

How can you in your group start building transparency in how each of you understand and interpret the concept of sustainability?

You can use the paper by Hopwood, Mellor, and O’Brien (2005) as a starting point, but feel free to bring other sources of inspiration into the discussion.

Aim

By the end of this topic, you will have had the opportunity to:

connect with other participants and your facilitators
learn about and discuss problem-based and collaborative learning in the context of HEDS
explore central questions and experiences related to meaning making, belonging in this interconnected world, and our role in transforming to a sustainable society.

Checklist

Check that you have done everything described in the “getting started week”

Find your way to your assigned PBL group community
Introduce yourself in your PBL group
Upload the initial individual reflection
Attend the Connecting webinar or watch the recording
Attend the meeting(s) in your group
Check out the FISh model
See the suggested agenda for group meetings
Check out the suggested agreement for the group
Contribute to the presentation of your group
Contribute to the group creation
Decide within the group who will upload the group creation and upload it

Readings and other resources

Bold-faced entry are suggested readings for the group creation and discussion webinar.

On different conceptions of sustainability:

A selection of models from Hopwood (2005), Persson, Hedenus & Sprei (2022) and Andreotti (2015) (this is a PDF)
Hopwood, B., Mellor, M., and O’Brien, G. (2005). Sustainable development: mapping different approaches. Sustainable Development, 13(1):38–52. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/sd.244'
Hine, Dougald. (2024) Building good ruins - What are we talking about when we talk about sustainability, and what are we not talking about? The recording of the introduction to the 2024 iteration of HEDS. https://kauplay.kau.se/media/t/0_dz7c6nwc
Wals, E.J, A, Jickling, B (2022) “Sustainability” in higher education: From doublethink and newspeak to critical thinking and meaningful learning https://www.researchgate.net/publication/237152910_Sustainability_in_higher_education_From_doublethink_and_newspeak_to_critical_thinking_and_meaningful_learning

Connecting to the world around us in practice:

Holmqvist, D., & Millenberg, F. (2024). Carving space to learn for sustainable futures: A theory-informed adult education approach to teaching. European journal for Research on the Education and Learning of Adults, 15(3), 299-315. https://rela.ep.liu.se/article/view/5237/4405

On the current state of the world:

Richardson, J., Steffen W., Lucht, W., Bendtsen, J., Cornell, S.E., et.al. 2023. Earth beyond six of nine Planetary Boundaries. Science Advances, 9, 37: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adh2458
IPCC, 2023: Summary for Policymakers. In: Climate Change 2023: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Core Writing Team, H. Lee and J. Romero (eds.)]. IPCC, Geneva, Switzerland, pp. 1-34, doi: 10.59327/IPCC/AR6-9789291691647.001 https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/syr/downloads/report/IPCC_AR6_SYR_SPM.pdf
Sachs, J.D., Lafortune, G., Fuller, G. (2024). The SDGs and the UN Summit of the Future. Sustainable Development Report 2024. Paris: SDSN, Dublin: Dublin University Press. 10.25546/108572 https://dashboards.sdgindex.org/