AD ALTA
JOURNAL OF INTERDISCIPLINARY RESEARCH
INCREASING PUPILS´ INTEREST IN NATURE PROTECTION AND SUSTAINABLE
DEVELOPMENT THROUGH A PHILOSOPHICAL LITERARY STORY
a
SIMONA BORISOVÁ
Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra, Department of
Pedagogy, Drážovská cesta 4, 949 74 Nitra, Slovakia
email:
a
simona.borisova@ukf.sk
This study was supported by the Slovak Research and Development Agency under the
contract No. APVV-18-0484 as a part of the research Forest Pedagogy and Education
to Sustainable Development in pre-primary and primary education.
Abstract: The aim of the article is to analyse the possibilities of stimulating interest in
sustainable development, climate and environment improvement through work with
philosophical literary stories. In this article, we focus on a specific philosophical story
called The World According to Anna, written by the Norwegian philosopher and writer
Jostein Gaarder. The book is stated for readers of older school age. The main method
of the research part is the interpretation of the above artistic text with an emphasis on
the depiction of elements appearing as a motivation to think about the complex issues
of the environment and its protection. Subsequently, we discuss the possibilities of
working with similar books in the process of education.
Keywords: sustainable development, environmental improvement, education,
philosophical literary stories
1 Introduction
There are many ways to form a positive attitude towards the
environment and its sustainable development in working with
students. Which methods will be used to achieve this goal
depends primarily on the teacher, his relationship to nature, his
commitment to this issue, the nature of the school subject and
other factors. We consider the use of a philosophical literary
story with the theme of nature as an alternative to the traditional
methods of forming the values of nature protection. One of the
authors writing philosophical stories is Jostein Gaarder. In his
books (mainly philosophical literary stories) he deals with issues
of human existence, the essence of things and being, as well as
the search for the meaning of the origin of the world. Books of
this author are intended especially for children in the older
school age, but these stories can be read on several levels, so
they can also attract an adult reader. The book The World
According to Anna is popular among many readers of the world
with its parallel story, deep philosophical thoughts and simple
language. The main character, Anna, is a sixteen-year-old
curious girl, in some ways different from her peers and in some
ways she solves the same problems as current teenagers. We
recommend including the story according to the maturity of the
reader. The story (or its parts) can be included in several school
subjects. Except for literature, it can be biology, geography,
civics, history, ethics, religion, or some other subjects depending
on the topic of the curriculum. The teacher is able to work with
this artistic text in various ways, at least he can recommend the
text to pupils as an optional reading. Parts of the text can be used
as a stimulus for discussion in which values such as love,
honesty, nature protection, health, wisdom or education could be
solved.
2 Literary stories focused on nature protection and
sustainability
Several authors describe economic development as
a burdensome state for the functioning of nature (eg Špirko,
1999; Huba, 2004; Lipovetsky, 2007; Pelikán, 2011;
Pechočiaková Svitačová, 2020). There are many approaches to
raising awareness of the need for sustainable development.
Pechočiaková Svitačová (2020) pays attention to eco-literacy as
one of the components of education for sustainable development.
The author presents environmental literacy as useful in
transforming the economy into a sustainable one. She argues
over the continuation of negative global changes, the conflict
between man and nature and argues that the role of educational
institutions is to contribute to ensuring sustainable development
through education for sustainability. Although we do not
underestimate the influence of the media, politics, the economy
and other sectors in ensuring sustainable development, this paper
focus mainly on education as a necessary instrument of creating
a sustainable future. The connection between philosophy and
literature in relation to nature protection and sustainable
development is also represented by so-called eco-narratives, for
example Pintes (2020) deals with the issue of eco-narratives in
more detail.
In relation to this paper, we include the attitude of the authors
Kollárová, Karasová, Nagyová (2019), which clarify the
specifics of teaching the subjects of elementary realia at the first
stage of primary school in connection to literary texts. They
focus mainly on the curriculum about the forest environment,
which is associated with literary text and the subsequent
implementation of activating methods. Effective work with a
literary text about the forest environment is a subject to an
appropriate selection of the text, as well as functionally selected
tasks and questions that stimulate pupils´ activity of thinking.
We consider the implementation of a philosophical literary story
to be one of the ways to increase interest in nature protection and
sustainable development. The philosophical literary stories are
part of the artistic (fiction) literature, it contains philosophical
categories, but it is characterized by simplicity in the thematic,
content and linguistic aspect. The philosophical problems in this
specific text are not limited for adults and these stories don´t
have to be formulated in such a way they are too distant for
primary and secondary school pupils. One of the positive areas
of philosophizing is that people of almost all ages can participate
in it with pleasure and enjoyment. Working with a philosophical
literary story (for example asking philosophical questions,
discussion, role-playing) could provide the application of
specific cognitive, behavioural and socio-emotional skills
enriching pupils with challenges in nature protection.
3 Materials and Methods
The introduction of this paper shows that the primary material
for working with data is the literary story The World According
to Anna, written for pupils from about twelve years of age. We
consider this book as appropriate in raising awareness of
sustainable development and at the same time sufficiently
stimulating it to develop an interest in nature protection and
sustainable development by including a number of conflicting
philosophical concepts. The main method of this paper is the
interpretation of an artistic text and through it we deal with
concepts such as climate change, ecological disasters, plant and
animal extinction, cultural diversity, climate change and so on.
These elements potentially observable in a philosophical literary
story are subject to the interpretation of an artistic text, through
which we can reveal the deeper meanings and functions of the
text when focusing on the topic of nature protection and
sustainable development.
Interpretation simply represents the reduction of the original text
(in this case in written form) to key statements and at the same
time creating explanations of meanings. Chrz (2013) describes
the interpretation as extended understanding, ´answering the
unanswered´. Interpretation of a literary text is a method that
depends on the perception of the interpreting researcher, so it is
necessary to take care to avoid possible underinterpretation (not
displaying key elements of the literary text with respect to the
topic) or overinterpretation (displaying text elements that don´t
result from the text). In the following chapter, through the
interpretation of the literary text, we will reflect several elements
that may be useful in supporting the formation of a positive
relationship with nature.
3.1 Interpretation of the philosophical artistic text The World
According to Anna with a connection to the elements and
values of the environment
The title of the book suggests that the core of the story is the
inquiry of environmental issues. The reader encounters warnings
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