The Emergence of Education for Sustainable Development in Namibia’s Senior Primary English Language Curriculum: A Morphogenetic Case Study

Anelly Malua and Lausanne Olvitt
Additional contact information
Anelly Malua: Anelly Malua, Rhodes University, Grahamstown-Makhanda, South Africa.
Lausanne Olvitt: Lausanne Olvitt, Environmental Learning Research Centre, Rhodes University, Grahamstown-Makhanda, South Africa. E-mail: L.Olvitt@ru.ac.za

Journal of Education for Sustainable Development, 2024, vol. 18, issue 1, 56-76

Abstract: Senior Primary English Language Teaching is an important site for implementing Namibia’s Environmental Education and Education for Sustainable Development (EE/ESD) Policy. Language Teaching lends itself to ESD pedagogies and can be responsive to sustainability-oriented content. This article summarizes a qualitative case study of ESD implementation through the Senior Primary English Language curriculum between 1990 and 2018. Data included documents, a questionnaire with 43 Senior Primary English Language teachers in the Khomas Region of Namibia and in-depth interviews with 12 teachers. Framed by Margaret Archer’s social realist theory of Morphogenesis, the study’s findings point to a policy–practice disjuncture of relevance to policy makers, teacher educators and other ESD partners. The article recommends building English Language teachers’ agency for ESD implementation in Namibia by strengthening the EE/ESD foci in pre- and in-service teacher programmes, expanding and strengthening networks and school cluster subject groups, and prioritizing making environmental content knowledge more accessible through textbooks and other teaching resources.

Keywords: Namibia; senior primary English language teaching; EE/ESD implementation; morphogenesis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/09734082241282891 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:jousus:v:18:y:2024:i:1:p:56-76

DOI: 10.1177/09734082241282891

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Education for Sustainable Development
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().