Jordan Times
Thursday, October 28, 2004
Water conservation to be
included in school curricula
By Sarah Ryan
AMMAN — A project to include water conservation in the national school curricula
was officially launched on Tuesday evening during a presentation at an iftar
banquet at the Royal Society for the Conservation of Nature's Wild Jordan Cafe.
“I'm very happy and optimistic by the progress that has been made, Minister of
Education Khalid Touqan said.
“It's very important to spread information about water conservation because
Jordan is one of the poorest countries in terms of water resources,” he added.
The project involved the production of inserts for textbooks, a teacher's guide
and an e-learning CD for grades 1-11.
The 40 lessons to be included in the textbooks were completed earlier this year
and the e-learning package was officially handed over to the ministries of
education, and water and irrigation at the event.
“The point is to create a generation of students that can make good decisions
about water as they grow up,” said Mona Grieser, chief of party for Water
Efficiency and Public Information for Action (WEPIA).
The project is especially vital because a study in 1995-1996 showed that most
children in the country did not realise Jordan was a water-scarce country, noted
Grieser.
The project team began their research by going through the current textbooks for
social science, mathematics, vocational education, science and information
technology classes to see what water concepts were mentioned, said Mayyada Abu
Jaber, coordinator of the project at the RSCN.
Afterwards, the team rewrote these sections in a more interactive way,
emphasising critical thinking and problem solving skills, she explained.
No textbook on water conservation was created, Jaber explained. The team used
the integration approach to include water conservation in the five different
subjects. “The common thing was the concept itself,” she noted.
The water conservation concepts are also developed with the cognitive
development of the child, Abu Jaber said in her presentation.
Cartoons are used with the younger children and more advanced activities with
maps and newspaper articles are used with older students in the e-learning
component.
The reaction of children to the new educational material has been very positive
so far, according to RSCN Director General Khalid Irani. “They got very excited
actually to sit and do it,” explained Irani. “It's something different, more
challenging.”
However, Touqan said he believes this project should be complemented by other
ideas such as growing gardens and having water rationing in schools.
Irani said the RSCN is also looking to include more environmental education in
the national curriculum in the future.
Creating the water conservation material was a great opportunity to build
capacity for the education team at the RSCN, said Irani. “Hopefully this will
create a need for more environmental education and lead to biodiversity being
included in the national curriculum.”
The project to produce the educational material was a team effort by the RSCN,
WEPIA, USAID, the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Water and
Irrigation.