David T. Crowther

Benefits of Elementary Environmental Education

As society changes, so has its connection with the natural world, especially for children. This chapter briefly looks at how beneficial nature can be for children, even though their interaction with it has changed drastically in the past few decades. As organizations and researchers have become aware of this, they have searched to find ways to better existing natural science programs and develop new ones, which help children strengthen their identities and connections to the natural world. This chapter looks at one such program, an after-school nature club for fourth graders. This study revealed several beneficial findings in environmental identity development, which would be helpful for program development and policy design. Among the findings, the semiformal nature club helped students develop traits that couldn’t be measured on current standardized tests. By combining an understanding of cognitive development in children with key themes that emerged through nature club, the chapter concludes with a discussion on how to strengthen future programs and poses questions about current standardized tests, all of which would be helpful for policymakers.