Green chemistry approach towards responsible environmental behaviors

Abstract

The National Report of Malaysia on Development of Education by the Ministry of Education stated that education for sustainable development, in particular the concept and components of environmental education are implemented across curriculum at all levels of schooling. One of the key areas of the Green Strategies outlined in the Malaysia's National Policy on the Environment (2002) is 'Education and Awareness'. Among the strategies for Education and Awareness include integrating environment and development into educational activities from school to tertiary institutions for which relevant methods and materials will be developed. To this end, an integrated approach was adopted in delivering the content through a chemistry methods course offered to third year prospective chemistry teachers enrolled in a teacher education program at the university. Lectures included pedagogical knowledge necessary for teaching chemistry as well as concepts on education for sustainable development. In addition, students were involved in active learning activities such as writing, role play, simulated teaching and practical work involving green chemistry experiments throughout the entire semester (14 weeks). A module consisting ten green chemistry experiments and a teachers guide to EfSD were developed. The experiments were those from KBSM chemistry curriculum. The only difference between the experiment in this module and the ones in the KBSM chemistry curriculum is that the experiments in the module are environmentally sound and it integrates the concepts central to sustainable development. For example in the existing chemistry curriculum the rate of reaction is taught using sodium thiosulfate which is carcinogenic and not biodegradable. In the green chemistry experiment sodium thiosulfate was replaced by vitamin C which is not hazardous to health and the environment. The course was conducted for one semester consisting of 14 weeks. Two questionnaires were administered to the student teachers: Questionnaire on environmental values (QEV) and Motivation towards the environment scale (MTES). The QEV consists of items for three categories of values: egocentric, homocentric and biocentric. The findings showed that the integration of active learning and green chemistry experiments into the chemistry teaching methods course enabled students to be more aware of the environmental issues which brought about change in values. The students' values have moved to the biocentric continuum and more environmental. MTES contains 24 items with six subscales: intrinsic motivation, integrated regulation, identified regulation , introjected regulation, external regulation and amotivation. Results demonstrated that green chemistry experiments have significantly enhanced the students' self-determinate motivation. No significant changes were observed for the non-self determined extrinsic motivations of external regulation and amotivation. However, green chemistry has significantly influenced non-self determined introjection regulated motivation. It is proposed that the incorporation of green chemistry into the curriculum should be extended to the secondary Science/chemistry integrated curriculum (KBSM) as well.