Environmental issues are complex and multi-faceted. Especially because they can prompt deep feelings and strong opinions, educators must take a balanced approach to instruction . Environmental educators incorporate differing perspectives and points of view even-handedly and respectfully and present information with intellectual honesty. They involve learners in critical evaluation of data, results, models, conclusions, and opinions. Fairness and accuracy are watchwords for instruction.
Environmental education works both in and outside the classroom.
Instructors foster learners' innate curiosity and enthusiasm, providing them with early and continuing opportunities to explore their environment . Experiences outside the classroom are an important instructional strategy for engaging students in direct discovery of the world around them. This awareness of their local community can prompt a personal commitment to apply skills and knowledge in pursuit of environmental quality and quality of life. Finally, environmental education provides opportunities for learners to enhance their capacity for independent thinking and effective, responsible action . Engaging in individual and group experiences helps learners develop these capacities independently and in collaborative situations that anticipate the ways in which problem-solving happens in the community, on the job, and in the family.