Teaching sustainability in Higher Education language courses in Finland

What is it about?

We examined how sustainable development and its teaching is perceived by 43 university language centre teachers in Finland. In addition to higher education teachers' attitudes towards sustainable development, we also investigated the methods teachers use to implement education for sustainable development (ESD). The quantitative data were analysed using percentage distributions and correlation analysis, while the open-ended responses were examined using data-driven qualitative content analysis.

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Photo by Katja Ano on Unsplash

Photo by Katja Ano on Unsplash

Why is it important?

Using our mixed methods research design, we found that: *The respondents’ attitudes towards sustainability in language teaching were generally very positive, and the majority of teachers incorporated sustainability — mostly cultural sustainability — topics into their lessons. *Most common pedagogical approaches to teach SD topics were pair or group discussions. Working with texts, films, literature or music, as well as group work, was also popular. *Teachers were motivated to integrate sustainability in their teaching based on four types of reasons: teacher-driven, student-driven, language-related and external reasons. *Teacher-driven reasons were by far the most prominent. The teachers wanted to positively influence students’ behavior, strengthen students’ critical thinking skills, and contribute to positive change.

Perspectives