The Pedagogies of purpose (POP) toolkit is a visual representation of core ESD pedagogy that distils the UNESCO competencies and the UNECE Competency framework to provide six simplified tiles with Transformative Learning as a core axis.

Beneath the wheel are six accompanying questions to reflect on when designing activities, materials, assessment or curricula to embed ESD pedagogy into teaching and learning.

ESD pedagogy in many ways is just good pedagogy - but it has the added orientation of pedagogy to do good; pedagogy with purpose.

Key pedagogical approaches in ESD

A learner-centred approach

Learner-centred pedagogy sees students as autonomous learners and emphasizes the active development of knowledge rather that its mere transfer and/or passive learning experiences. The learners’ prior knowledge as well as their experiences in the social context are the starting points for stimulating learning processes in which the learners construct their own knowledge base. Learner-centred approaches require learners to reflect on their own knowledge and learning processes in order to manage and monitor them. Educators should stimulate and support those reflections. Learner-centred approaches change the role of an educator to one of being a facilitator of learning processes (instead of being an expert who only transfers structured knowledge) (Barth, 2015).

Action-oriented learning

In action-oriented learning, learners engage in action and reflect on their experiences in terms of the intended learning process and personal development.The experience might come from a project (in-service learning), an internship, the facilitation of a workshop,

the implementation of a campaign, etc. Action-learning refers to Kolb’s theory of the experiential learning cycle with the following stages: 1. Having a concrete experience, 2. Observing and reflecting, 3. Forming abstract concepts for generalization and 4. Applying themin new situations (Kolb,1984). Action-learning increases knowledge acquisition, competency development and values clarification by linking abstract concepts to personal experience and the learner’s life. The role of the educator is to create a learning environment that prompts learners’experiences and reflexive thought processes.

                                                                                     Transformative learning

Transformative learning can best be defined by its aims and principles, rather than by any concrete teaching or learning strategy. It aims at empowering learners to question and change the ways they see and think about the world in order to deepen their understanding of it (Slavich and Zimbardo, 2012; Mezirow, 2000). The educator is a facilitator who empowers and challenges learners to alter their worldviews. The related concept of transgressive learning (Lotz-Sisitka et al., 2015) goes one step further: It

underlines that learning in ESD has to overcome the status quo and prepare the learner for disruptive thinking and the co-creation of new knowledge.

UNESCO (2017) Education for Sustainable Development Goals: Learning Objectives