Environmental Education - Special Topic 3 -Environment Defined -Types of Environment -Ecology -Ecosystem -Man and Environment

1. Environment
and Education
SPECIAL TOPIC 3
ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION

2. ENVIRONMENT
DEFINED
P. Gisbert says, ‘Environment is
anything immediately surrounding
an object and exerting a direct
influence on it.’

3. T. D. Elliot defines environment ‘as
the field of effective stimulation
and interaction for any unit of
living matter.’
ENVIRONMENT
DEFINED

4. ENVIRONMENT
DEFINED
E. J. Ross says ‘environment is
a external force which
influences us.’

5. CLASSIFICATION OF
ENVIRONMENT
1. Natural Environment
2. Social Environment
3. Cultural Environment

6. ECOLOGY
First proposed by a German
biologist, Ernest Haeckel, in 1869
•Ecology is ‘the study of the total
relations of the animal both to its
inorganic and to its organic
environment, including its friendly and
inimical relations with those animals
and plants in which it comes directly
or indirectly in contact.

7. OTHER DEFINITIONS
OF ECOLOGY
Ecology is the science of the
community (Frederick Clements,
1916).
Ecology is the science of all the
relations of all the organisms to all
their environment (Trailor, 1936).

8. Ecology is the study of
interrelationships of plants and
animals with their environment
(Clarke, 1954).
Ecology is the scientific study of the
structure and functions of nature
(Odum, 1963).
Ecology, in a broad sense, is the
study of ecosystem (Misra, 1970).

9. ECOSYSTEM
An ecosystem is a small segment of
nature embracing the community of
living things plus the physical
environment.
The basic and most important concept
of an ecosystem is that everything is
somehow related to everything else in
nature.

10. MAJOR TYPES OF
ECOSYSTEMS:
•seas
•estuaries and seashores
•fresh water systems
•deserts
•tundra
•grasslands
•tundra

11. GENERAL PRINCIPLES
OR CHARACTERISTICS
OF ECOSYSTEMS (SMITH,
1966)
1. The ecosystem is a major
structural and functional unit of
ecology.

12. 2. The structure of an ecosystem is
related to its species diversity;
the more complex ecosystems
have a high species diversity.
3. The function of the ecosystem is
related to energy flow and
material cycling through ad
within ecosystem.

13. 4. The relative amount of energy
needed to maintain an ecosystem
depends on its structure. The
more complex structure, the
lesser the energy it needs to
maintain itself.
5. Ecosystems mature by passing
from less complex to more
complex states.

14. 6. Both the environment and the energy
fixation in any given ecosystem are
limited and cannot be exceeded
without causing serious undesirable
effects.
7. Alterations in the environment
represent selective pressures upon
the population to which it must adjust.
Organisms which are unable to adjust
to the change, environment vanish.

15. MAN AND
ENVIRONMENT
‘Every action has an equal and
opposite reaction.’ – Newton’s
third law
•Equally apply to man’s
relationship with nature as it
relates to application of force on
inanimate objects.

16. Man is unique in many ways.
- the ability to subordinate
nature and natural resources