Taiwan Middle School: Environmental Awareness Promotion Report (Assessment)

Background: Challenges and Opportunities of a School Teacher in Taiwan

Environmental issues have been on the agenda of the citizens of Taiwan for several decades (Kao, Kao, & Tsai, 2017). Because of the increasingly fast pace of industrialization coupled with little to no concern for its effects on the environment, the pollution levels, and the related issues have become notorious in the state (Kao et al., 2017). Therefore, introducing students to the essential information about the strategies for preventing further aggravation of the environmental scenario in Taiwan, as well as protecting themselves from the threats of pollution, must be recognized as crucial tasks.

Activity: Description, Progress, and Essential Lessons Learned

To encourage independence and curiosity in learners, a team project was used as the key activity that was supposed to spur their enthusiasm to investigate the problem. The participants were encouraged to utilize all available resources, including books, scholarly articles, and trustworthy Internet sites. Apart from teaching the target population about environmental concerns, the specified activity promoted active collaboration and, thus, taught the students the importance of working in teams. Therefore, the development of qualities such as the ability to cooperate, manage information, and address possible conflicts was spurred in the students. At the end of the project, the teams had to deliver a presentation with a poster that detailed a particular phenomenon, process, or solution to an environmental issue.

Links to the Environmental Health and the Course

The activity described above was linked directly to the course and the essential information about environmental health, in general, as well as some of the problems associated with it, such as high pollution levels caused by the increasingly fast pace of industrialization. They were shedding light on the factors that have contributed to the pollution of the Taiwanese environment allowed showcasing the importance of understanding the causes of an environmental problem for its further elimination. Moreover, the case under analysis allowed detailing the steps necessary for the following risk assessment and the production of solutions for managing the situation. Finally, the learners saw how the elements of the environment interact and what effects these interactions can produce. Therefore, a direct link to the course was established during the teaching process.

Setting Further Goals and Expectations: Developing Independence

While the community service that I carried out while working as a teacher in a Taiwanese middle school has led to the expected results, it was also necessary to make sure that the acquired experience should inform the further strategies for addressing the issue of environmental awareness in Taiwan. For instance, it will be essential to promote new tools for risk communication. The introduction of the innovative IT devices will be a welcome step in improving the current management of environmental issues; thus, the active collaboration between the participants and the following enhancement of the processes linked to building awareness will become a possibility.

Conclusion: Introducing Improvement into the Classroom Environment

The process of encouraging learners to engage in the issues associated with the environmental problems faced by Taiwan turned out to be quite successful due to the emphasis on collaboration within teams and the promotion of communication between its members. In addition, motivating the learners to introduce improvements into the realm of the Taiwanese environment was carried out successfully. The outcomes of the project, therefore, indicate that the issues related to the environmental problems in Taiwan can be handled once useful tools for raising awareness and engaging the target population to contribute to the development of viable solutions are incorporated into the management framework.

Reference

Kao, T. S., Kao, H. F., & Tsai, Y. J. (2017). The context, status and challenges of environmental education in formal education in Taiwan. Japanese Journal of Environmental Education, 26(4), 15-20.