Programme director
School principals and educators
Learners
Parents
Ladies and gentlemen
Good evening
Tonight is a special night where we acknowledge and award those who demonstrated an outstanding performance in this competition. I am very much elated to be part of this ceremony this evening because I am passionate about environmental issues. I always say that the environment doesn't need us, we need the environment. We should therefore take it upon ourselves to advocate for environmental education and awareness.
What better way can we use to relay information either than to educate and pass information to the young generation so that they can also do the same. Remember we inherited the environment from our forefathers and it is incumbent upon us to nature it for the next generation hence I say that I am pleased by the participation of young people in this competition. We are not here to only award winners this year but to also acknowledge all participants irrespective of whether they got the first prize or not.
The component Environmental Empowerment / Advisory Services in partnership with Ezemvelo KwaZulu-Natal Wildlife annually host the environmental competition. This competition is focused on schools around the province and is a way of awareness raising and capacity building on environmental issues.
The department hosted its first provincial environmental speech contest in 2008 at Ithala Game Reserve and the winners of the speech contest were announced by the MEC at the World Environment Day event on 6June 2008 at Phongola Local Municipality. In 2009 the department expanded the competition by not only hosting the speech contest but also an art competition. This was done in order to accommodate a wide range of learners, both primary and secondary schools thus creating more awareness on environmental issues. The focus was also shifted to special schools to accommodate learners who are physically challenged.
The theme for this year’s competition is “Species roles, one planet, securing our future”.This theme is in line with the current year’s theme which is “the international year of biodiversity”. The theme encourages learners to focus on the flora and fauna and how they interact with each other. This theme targets a number of environmental issues and climate change is one of them, as it is an environmental issue that needs the society to be capacitated on.
This year’s competition was done on the 17 February at Hluhluwe Nature Reserve. The competition was divided into three categories:
- Grade 6 speech (Learners are to submit and present speech on the theme to a panel of judges, who in turn will ask follow up questions to the learners and then give them scores)
- Grade 6 art (Learners are to present and submit their art work to a panel of judges, who in turn will ask follow up questions to the learners and then give them scores)
- Special school art (Learners with special needs (disability) are to submit their art work to a panel of judges, who will score them according to their art work only).
Learners and educators have shown special dedication to the competition and the environment as a whole, because of the extent of the research that was done on the topic. This has been witnessed in the high quality and standard of work that was showcased during the competition.
The department would like to congratulate all the schools that have entered the competition representing their districts; the educators on their hard work, preparing and assisting the learners on the topic; the learners for their dedication and ensuring that they make it through to the finalists.
The South African constitution links environmental rights to human rights and social justice. Section 24 of the Bill of Rights (SA Constitution) states that “everyone has a right to an environment that is not harmful to their health and well-being.” and “ to have the environment protected. For the present and future generations”.
This commitment to environmental and social justice has been incorporated into different legislations and policies of various government departments, for example the NEMA act of the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism. In response to this constitutional requirement, the Department of Education (DoE) ensured that the link between social justice, human rights and a healthy environment is a fundamental principle of the National Curriculum Statement (NCS). This interrelationship has been written into each of the eight Learning Areas, ensuring that environmental learning forms part of (is integral to) each Learning Area, instead of a separate subject taken by only some learners.
The critical outcomes of the NCS are derived from the constitution, and envisages amongst others, learners who are able to:
- identify and solve problems and make decisions using critical and creative thinking
- collect, analyse, organise and critically evaluate information
- communicate effectively using visual, symbolic and/or language skills in various modes.
South African education policy is thus in line with international trends asking for confident, independent, critical, environmentally literate learners with the ability to actively participate in societal development programmes. Teacher support programmes that focus on bringing out the environmental focus of each Learning Area are thus needed, in order to orientate teachers to this new emphasis of the NCS. The National Environmental Education Project (NEEP-GET) initiated by the national Department of Education attempted to provide this support, but since this programme came to an end in 2003, no further support programme for teachers has been in place.
Part of the job functions of the environmental empowerment /advisory services, who run education and awarenessprogrammes in the KwaZulu-Natal Department of Agriculture, Environmental Affairs and Rural Development (DAEARD) include:
- Participate in the implementation of environmental education programs to assist with the integration of environmental education into formal education
- Ensure the integration of environmental education into all relevant structures (formal and informal) which would include:
- Keep abreast of (research) the latest environmental education strategies and programs nationally and provincially to identify trends
- Provide inputs into relevant environmental learning material when required
- Provide support in the implementation of environmental education strategies in institutions through workshops / presentations.
In order to perform these functions, advisory staff has to be knowledgeable of current education policy requirements, new methods and trends. Traditionally however, ourofficials conduct environmental awareness events at schools through talks, presentations (sometimes poetry, song and drama), tree-planting, clean-up campaigns, food gardens and celebrations of environmental special days(like world environment day). These events often clash with the normal school programme and has led to a reluctance of many schools to open their doors to DAEARD environmental awareness raising programmes. Education officials frequently quote the low literacy and numeracy scores of learners as one reason why awareness programmes outside of the school’s normal programme are not eagerly accepted, since it involves disrupting planned classroom teaching and learning activities.
A new approach to working with schools that supports teachers in implementing the curriculum, as opposed to environmental awareness programmes that interfere with daily teaching and learning activities in the classroom will benefit both Department of Education and DAEARD.
It is essential that the programme initiated by the department target a specific Learning Area that best deals with the aims of the programme. As we were dealing with a speech competition, the languages (English home and first additional) were targeted, and in particular learning Outcome 2: Speaking. Since the NCS is grade specific as opposed to the previous version of the curriculum that was phase specific, it was decided to implement the competition in grades 8, 9 and 10. The competition was developed as a week-long lesson plan for teachers of English, involving critically investigating our environmental rights, a local environmental issue and the development of public speaking skills in support of Learning Outcome 2: Speaking, which aims “to develop learners who will be able to communicate confidently and effectively in spoken Language in a wide range of situations”.
The competition included the following capacity building processes:
- Curriculum-based materials development including a one-week lesson plan, training manual and learner workbook
- Professional development workshop for DAEARD officials
- Professional developmentworkshops for teachers in each district
- Classroom implementation of theone-week lesson plan
- District-level inter-schools competitions
- Provincial competition
- Environmental event where winners form part of the proceedings.
The competition thus had a life-long learning focus, since everyone involved in the competition, including departmental officials; teachers and learners went through some aspect of learning and personal development, relevant to their work. Learners were supported in developing various speaking skills, from discussions in classroom groups, makinga speech in the classroom,speaking at the district and provincial finals, to finally presenting a public speech as a guest of the Minister of Agriculture and Environmental Affairs at a public meeting (over 5 000 people).
Sustainability of this competition is vital, because you educate a child, you educate a nation and children are a good source of transferring information and leaders of tomorrow.
I thank you.
