Abstract ♦ The article argues in favor of developing an environmental consciousness as a component of the general environmental culture of a person. This consciousness will act as a regulator of an environmentally relevant behavior. We have chosen the Republic of Kazakhstan as the subject of our case study.
The Republic’s Environmental Code postulates that forming an active civic stand on preserving nature and being friendly to nature is a priority task for the education system. Schools actualize the need for new techniques and methods to solve this problem.
Among the factors which influence the choice of individual behavior pattern, alongside with normative regulation and state-supported education, also are the individual’s personal attitude, their responsibility and awareness, understanding their place in the world and the profound connection with the environment. Environmental consciousness shapes the reflective attitude towards nature, an attitude based on rational knowledge, emotional link and self-regulation of environmental behavior. Such consciousness begins to emerge in early childhood, but becomes especially topical in adolescence.
Natural sciences, such as geography and biology, have the highest potential among other school subjects in helping form knowledge about nature, man and the world around. Each of these disciplines shapes its own aspect of the attitude towards man and reality. They are taught from Grade 6 of secondary school, which marks the most sensitive period for developing environmental consciousness.
Urekeshova Larisa, Postgraduate, Department of the Pedagogy and Psychology of Higher School, Moscow University for the Humanities. Postal address: 5 Yunosti St., Moscow, Russian Federation, 111395. Tel.: +7 (499) 374-74-59. E-mail: . Research adviser: Doctor of Pedagogy, Professor V. A. Sitarov.
Citation: Urekeshova, L. (2014) O formirovanii ekologicheskogo samosoznaniia lichnosti v protsesse shkol'nogo obrazovaniia (na primere Respubliki Kazakhstan) [Forming an Individual’s Environmental Self-consciousness in Secondary School (The Case of the Republic of Kazakhstan)]. Znanie. Ponimanie. Umenie, no. 4, pp. 303–308. (In Russ.).
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