The management of electronic wastes is increasingly becoming a challenge in the contemporary world. As the world is being globalized, the emerging technologies are bringing new tools and machines that make life much easier. The problem is that this comes at a cost to the environment.
The electronic wastes are the biggest threat to the ecosystem. They are threatening to ruin the natural habitat for various organisms across the world.
The phones, personal computers, and calculators make the bulk of the electronic wastes today. These gadgets are very dangerous to the environment if they are not disposed carefully.
It has been proven that most of the people who are most attracted to the above gadgets are the youths. The risk is that they rarely take into account, the threat that this move would expose them to.
It is therefore necessary to create a four-unit course for the college students to create awareness among them of the importance to take care of the environment (Caulfield, 2011).
They should be made to appreciate the fact that the electronic gadgets are dangerous to the environment and therefore should be disposed with a lot of care.
Course Description
This course would focus on the management of the environment. The focus will be on how well youths, and the entire society would be responsible for the maintenance of the natural habitat with the aim of ensuring that its existence is not threatened.
It is dangerous to assume that nature will take care of itself, as most youths always do. It is therefore important that through this course, students be made to appreciate that the management of the environment is their responsibility. They should also understand that this responsibility should be taken collectively.
The course would focus on the past human activities that have resulted in serious negative impacts to the environment. It will involve heavy case studies of places that were green and beautiful, but have been transformed for the worst.
Of interest will be the deserts that have been created through careless actions of man. The case studies will also focus on other harm that the environmental degradation has caused to humankind.
It is crucial that this course starts with practical factors in the natural environment that the student can easily relate to and comprehend. This way, they will have a clear mind of the lessons being taught and its practicality.
It is also important to start with the immediate environment because this will allow the concerned students understand the objectives of the course.
As the course develops, it would capture scientific facts that would require abstract reasoning on the side of the student. Bringing abstract reasoning at the advanced stage of the lesson is very important.
This is because it would allow the student to relate the abstract reasoning with the information that was gathered at the initial stages of the course. The focus would now be on the effect of the radioactive materials that are emitted from phones.
The course should specifically analyze the emissions from the electronic gadgets. The learners should be made to understand how the emissions would affect the environment and its inhabitants. It should be made clear to the learners that the worst affected organisms are the human beings.
The course would explain the risks that people are exposed to when these emissions are released in residential areas or places where people frequent.
The course should then hypothesize what the environment would be in future if immediate measures were not taken today. The hypothesis would be realistic so that they learners may appreciate the fact that it may be a reality.
The must be made to feel that if there is no change of the trend, the environment would be completely inhabitable to human being. The course should make the learners feel responsible. They should be made to feel that they have the future of a beautiful and peaceful world in their hands.
The objective of the course would be to ensure that the youths are responsible for the management of wastes, especially the electronic wastes.
The course aims at turning the youths from pollution agents, to environmental champions who would do all that is within their capacity to ensure that our environment is made kept free from pollution (Posner & Rudnitsky, 2006).
The course hopes to create environmentalists out of the students. It is hoped that if implemented successfully, youths would be willing to participate in various environmental programs that would help reduce environmental pollution.
The course will be based on the environmental pollution. However, the scope will be broadened to capture other forms of pollution, especially the plastics.
The youths have also been associated with pollution through plastic wrappings. The course hopes to make them green belt champions who would not only avoid polluting the environment, but also fight against any form of pollution to the environment.
Course Learning Outcomes
This course would be very vital not only to the college but also to the country at large. There is a current trend where organizations are trying to make an impact towards ensuring that the world is freed from pollution. Every institution has been encouraged to make an impact from the immediate environment.
Institutions of higher learning have faced great challenge in implementing this policy. Students do not care about the environment.
Although the institutions would hire workers to help in planting trees, grass, and ensuring that the compound is generally clean, student would come with their plastic wrappers and dispose them all over the compound.
They would also destroy the vegetations through various actions. This has been a big challenge to these institutions.
The outcome of this course is expected to change this. It is expected that this course would help various student within these institutions appreciate the importance of maintaining a clean and green environment.
The outcome of this course would be a situation where student would be working hand-in-hand with the employees of the college to ensure that the environment is maintained.
It is also expected that from this course, students would take the initiative of scouting for any form of electronic waste within the environment (Hansen, 2011). They should be seen to lead from the front in managing all forms of wastes, especially those that are harmful to the environment and to people.
It is also the expectation of the researcher that this course would have an impact in the corporate organizations. The students are in better position to demand from the corporate leaders a cleaner environment.
By enlightening them of the importance of a safe environment, the students would be willing to push the corporate leaders to reduce industrial wastes. The student can challenge these leaders by organizing corporate social responsibility where they engage in tree planting.
This way, they will be passing message to these leaders that they will not take the issue of environmental degradation lightly.
The main outcome that this course aims at is to develop a culture among the learners. The learners should develop a culture of environmental conservation. They should be made to have the feeling that they are the future of a green tomorrow, irrespective of their position in life.
The course should develop a habit among the student that would never fade. They should not stop caring for the environment immediately they come out of the college.
This should be a lifelong practice. It should be instilled in them that they are responsible for a green environment. This way, it is expected that when they join the corporate world, they will champion environmental rights. They will oppose any move by the corporate leaders to pollute the environment.
Course Design
This four-unit course would run for the whole semester. The course would be targeted to two sections of the syllabus of the college. The first target will be the first year students. Immediately they join the college, they would be introduced to this course.
They will take three units of the course that would involve the theoretical work. They will be introduced to environmental degradation, and what accounts for environmental conservation (Posner & Rudnitsky, 2006).
They would be made to understand their role, as student and as society members in the management of the environment.
They will be introduced to the emerging trends in the e-wastes; they will be made to understand the impact of some of the actions that are always considered inconsequential, like careless disposal of electronic wastes.
During this first year, the concept of the course would be made simple and very clear. The next move would be ensuring that the students appreciate that there is a relationship between the dangers posed by the electronic wastes, and the threat of plastic bags to the environment.
This would be followed by the introduction of the students to waste management. The students must appreciate the fact that they are responsible for the nature around them.
At the end of the semester, the student should be able to bring abstract reasoning of the possible consequences of environmental pollution, and the current environmental conditions.
They should be in a position to create in their minds, how tomorrow will be if they fail to take the responsibility of environmental conservation today.
In their final year, the students would be expected to write a project. This project would be compulsory to all the final year students and none of them would be able to graduate unless they undertake the project.
In this project, the student would chose a topic related to environmental degradation caused by the electronic wastes and write a comprehensive report on it.
The emphasis of the report would be on the literature review, the discussion on the facts found from primary research, and the recommendations made after the analysis of the primary and secondary data.
The literature review would be given importance because it would demonstrate that the student did a research on environmental degradation. The primary data will be a demonstration that the student has the capacity to conduct meaningful research.
The recommendations will give a clear feeling of the student towards environmental degradation. The recommendations will also help the examiner determine the ability of the student to blend his primary research with the secondary data in coming with concrete conclusion.
The Importance of the Design in Promoting Course Outcomes
The course design given above is very important in promoting the outcomes expected of the course. The outcome of the course was to transform the students into environmental champions, both at school and as corporate leaders.
By bringing the first three units at the beginning of the course, it would help bring the attention of the student to the fact that the environment needs him or her. They are initiated to this immediately they join college. They will spend their entire life at college knowing that they are expected to take care of the environment.
The last unit is the project, which comes at the end of their time in the college. This is meant to bring back their focus to the importance of the managing the environment and to ensure that they get into the society as persons who appreciates the need for a green environment.
They will leave the college appreciating the relevance of environmental management.
The Assessment of the Assignment
The basis of assessing the assignment would be taken in two approaches. In the first approach, the examiners would assess the students’ ability to comprehend environmental factors that may constitute pollution.
The examiner will also asses the ability of the learners to relate physical factors about the environment that is currently visible, and the future factors that would require some abstract reasoning (Dubin & Olshtain, 1988).
This would take place in their first year at school in the first three units. In the last unit, the examiner would focus on the three sections of the report as discussed above.
The teacher would also need to develop immediate mechanisms that would help in determining if the concepts of the course are understood in class. The teacher can organize assignments to be done individually or collectively at a specified time.
The teacher would have to award makes to the students, which will account for a specific percentage of the entire course. The learner would also be expected to sit for a continuous assessment test (popularly known as CAT) in order to assess their level of comprehension of this course.
This assessment would also account for a given percentage of the entire course. The last exam in the end of their first semester in their first year would be administered to determine the overall knowledge gained by the student in respect to this course and it should account for the maximum marks.
Teaching Aids
This topic is very rich. It has attracted the attention of various professional in various fields. Plenty of teaching aids therefore exists that can enhance the understanding of the students. The media is a rich source of the teaching aids.
The mass media can provide plenty of resources such as pictures and documentaries in this field. The social medial would also help students share useful resources. The use of the multimedia as source of teaching aid would enhance learning.
References
Caulfield, J. (2011). How to design and teach a hybrid course: Achieving student-centered learning through blended classroom, online and experiential activities. Sterling: Stylus Pub.
Dubin, F., & Olshtain, E. (1988). Course design: Developing programs and materials for language learning. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hansen, E. (2011). Idea-based learning: A course design process to promote conceptual understanding. Sterling: Stylus.
Posner, G. J., & Rudnitsky, A. N. (2006). Course design: A guide to curriculum development for teachers. Boston: Pearson.