The United Kingdom Government announced it is considering introducing compulsory nature studies lessons for all students as part of a David Attenborough-backed plan for the natural world's protection.
The Independent reported that the Department for Education or DfE is currently actively looking into whether students could be made to take lessons that concentrate on biodiversity and ecology, following the step's recommendation by a breakthrough government review published in February 2021.
The introduction of such lessons at all levels of education from primary to upper levels was a key suggestion of the Dasgupta review, introduced by the government to develop ways to change the manner a person thinks, acts, and gauges economic success while having nature protected.
The recommendations of the said review were reportedly passionately endorsed by Sir David, leading naturalist of Britain who described the said suggestions as a map for navigating a trail towards the restoration of biodiversity of Earth and the compass that's urgently needed to save the natural world at what may be considered as last minute.
Related information on biodiversity is shown on TED-Ed's YouTube video below.
Reason for Requiring the Study of Nature
Professor Partha Dasgupta, a well-known Cambridge economist, the review's author, said the education system needs to introduce nature studies from the earliest stages of people's lives and revisit them in the years spent in both secondary and tertiary levels of education.
The review also added that each child in each nation is owed the teaching of natural history, to be introduced to the natural world's awe and wonder, and to appreciate how it's contributing to humans' lives.
Dasgupta said, if today's generation cares about the common future and the descendants' common future, it should all partly be a naturalist.
Furthermore, the review also specifies that study of nature should be required at all levels, even in tertiary, adding, even if nature had been studied at the primary level, such a subject might not be encountered successively.
To Help Develop a 'Love of Nature'
The purpose of lessons about nature would help the students, both children and teens, develop a 'love of nature,' not to mention get the information needed to act as 'judge and jury' of their own actions on the environment.
Nick Gibb, the school minister, said that in response to an initial question on the matter, the government would study the review's findings and formally respond in due course.
He explained ministers were considering the options of introducing a new GCSE in natural history following receipt of a proposal from the OCR exam board, although they did not commit at this particular stage.
For the first time, however, Gibb too, that an A-level qualification in environmental science had been introduced in 2017. In connection to this, according to the DFE officials, no firm decision had not yet been made on whether natural history or ecology could be made compulsory as the review recommends.
Green MP Caroline Lucas, who has been persuading ministers for the said change said, the lessons were badly needed.
Lucas elaborated, it has been a long time and too much hard work by a lot of people to get this far, although now, it appears, we're getting nearer ecology and natural history with a much firmer place on the curriculum, as a changed appreciation of green spaces and nature is growing.
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