Abstract:

Sustainable development has been one of the overarching objectives of the United Nations. Member countries and stakeholders are reorienting education at all levels of the system to overcome the environmental, social and economic challenges that the world faces, and to achieve a sustainable future. There has been a strong increase in the integration of ESD (Education for Sustainable Development) into secondary education; however, research is needed to assess the relevance of the curriculum to meet the environmental, social and economic dimensions of ESD. With this article, we attempted to analyze the learning objectives of the Turkish secondary school chemistry curriculum in terms their relevance to ESD. Content analysis was used for assessing the objectives of the curriculum; and criteria set is comprised of the environmental, social and economic dimensions of ESD. The results of the study indicate that the objectives of the curriculum are lacking in addressing the social and economic aspects, and are focused on the environmental aspect of ESD. Hence, Turkish secondary school chemistry curriculum needs improvement in its relevancy to ESD.

Keywords:

Education for sustainable development, chemistry curriculum, curriculum analysis, content analysis.