We are Didaktik.gw!
Introducing our research group
Due to its integrative approach and reflection of human-environment relationships in a glocal perspective, i.e. at different spatial levels, the subject of geography and economics is of great importance in the horizon of a socio-ecological transformation in the subject canon. This is because a successful geography lesson addresses key problems and future issues in a globalized world from multiple perspectives and offers students opportunities to learn to understand them in a critical and reflective way. In this way, geographic and socio-economic education empowers students to participate responsibly in shaping the future.
The research of the working group currently focuses on the following topics
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Education, understood as a critical-reflexive process of transformation of self-world relations;
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Sustainability, situated in the educational-theoretical field of tension between purpose orientation and emancipation;
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Digitality, in its significance for spatial experience and social practice.
The Research Group Didactics for Geography and Economics (RFDZ-GW) cooperates with schools and universities in Styria and nationally and internationally with partners from science, formal and informal educational institutions, e.g. the Environmental Education Center Styria, as well as school practice.
In teaching, the aim of the working group is to train prospective teachers to become reflective practitioners; against this background, the didactic part of the GW teacher training course is realized in several courses in the mode of research-based learning, i.e. research-oriented, practical, project-based and reflective.
In this way, the Graz didactics of didactics of didactics of didactics of didactics contributes to strengthening the profile-forming area of Climate Change Graz and participates in the research networks The Human Factor in Digitalization and Didactics of Didactics.
The research carried out by the Didactics of Global Change working group examines the conditions for the success of critical-reflective education in global change lessons and teacher training. Both a theoretical-conceptual and a qualitative-empirical paradigm are pursued using participatory and hermeneutic-interpretative methods.
The group's current research focuses on
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transformative learning processes in schools and universities;
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emancipatory education for sustainable development;
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critical media education in the culture of digitality;
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theory-practice relations in teacher training;
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extracurricular learning venues in the teaching of general knowledge.
The dissemination and implementation of the research results in school practice is ensured on the one hand by research-related and project-based teacher training in the mode of research-based learning and on the other hand by the development of practical teaching concepts and further training courses for teachers.
Our projects
INTERACT
Tackling ESD related wicked problems in geography teacher training with multimodal vignettes
In the EU-funded Cooperation Partnership in Higher Education, we are developing an ESD teaching concept together with the TU Dresden and the Fontys University of Applied Science in Tilburg to improve the didactic training of teachers in European exchange. The teaching concept is dedicated to the teaching of complex and controversial topics in the context of a socio-ecological transformation based on the reflection of authentic teaching situations.
Funding: European Commission (ERASMUS+)
Period: 10/2022-09/2026
EAT+CHANGE
Nutrition as an everyday transformation: participatory research and learning together for socio-ecological change
As part of EAT+CHANGE, pupils from three secondary schools in Graz are working as co-researchers with academic researchers from the University of Graz to explore nutritional practices and their socio-cultural contexts in everyday life. They identify strengths, weaknesses and potential for change in the local environment. In the process, previously invisible layers of knowledge are made visible and a dialog is entered into with the local public.
Funding: BMBWF, OeAD; further information: www.sparklingscience.at
Period: 10/2022-09/2025
NormESD
Teachers' perspectives on normativity in an Education for Sustainable Development
NormESD is dedicated to the manifestations of and dealing with contradictions and uncertainties of sustainable development in teaching practice. Qualitative methods are used to reconstruct action-guiding experiences and interpretations of Styrian teachers in the context of ESD in order to determine potentials for the further development of university-based ESD teacher training, the development of open educational resources and impulses for the ESD-specific further training offer.
Funding: Province of Styria
Period: 12/2021-11/2022
School Atlas Styria
The School Atlas of Styria is a cross-institutional project that has been continuously developed since 2004 in cooperation between our group, the RFDZ-GW and the Province of Styria. The core of the product range, which is constantly being updated and expanded, is an interactive atlas(www.schulatlas.at), but there is also a wide range of analog maps, teaching materials and games.
Funding: Own funds
Period: ongoing
Environmental education platform AGUAStud
AGUAStud stands for Arbeitsgemeinschaft umweltaktiver Studierender (www.aguastud.at), whose aim is to discover water as the "elixir of life" through joint activities with young people and to learn how nature "works" and how human activities influence the complex geosystem. The didactically supported projects are intended to make a contribution to education for sustainable development.
Funding: Own funds
Period: ongoing
Regional didactics center for geography and economics in Graz
The RFDZ-GW(www.rfdz.at) is a cooperation between our institute, the University College of Teacher Education Styria, the University College of Teacher Education Graz and the Styrian State School Board. Its main objective is to improve the teaching of the school subject GW through close cooperation between all Styrian institutions involved in the training and further education of teachers. Its tasks range from didactic research to the development of teaching materials.