The NEP (Children@School) is a tool that can be used to evaluate the efficacy of architectural design strategies for improving children's attitudes to the natural environment

This paper describes the development of a tool for measuring children's environmental attitudes at school so that the impact of the design of physical learning environments on environmental attitudes can be determined.  The importance of such a tool is based on the premise that environmental attitudes inform environmental behavior.

Seven primary schools in Victoria, Australia participated in this study: three schools with highly-visible education for sustainable development (ESD) features; four conventionally-designed schools without the ESD features. All three of the sustainably-designed schools had solar panels and water tanks located near or on the children's playgrounds. The three ESD schools also had gardens where the children could grow some of their own food. The two contrasting types of learning spaces (one with and one without ESD features) allowed for the testing of a tool -- the NEP (Children@School) -- to evaluate the extent to which the physical environment might impact children's environmental attitudes.

The NEP (Children@School) is an adaptation of the children's version of the New Ecological Paradigm (NEP), the most widely used environmental attitude scale for adults. The children's version -- the NEP for Children -- is appropriate for use with children aged ten to twelve. Reliability tests and factor analyses – along with data collected from 624 children of the same age (10-12) -- indicate that the NEP (Children@School) is appropriate for measuring the impact of learning spaces on the environmental attitudes of children. The 14-item scale consists of three reliable factors: Children's Environmental Attitudes towards Human Intervention, Children's Environmental Attitudes towards Eco-rights, and Children's Environmental Attitudes via ESD at School. The Human Intervention dimension considers the impact of human behaviors on nature; the Eco-right dimension addresses personal beliefs towards the environment; and the ESD at School dimension includes items that address sustainability features in school that facilitate children's connectedness with nature. These features can promote pro-environmental attitudes in children and provide opportunities for linking these attitudes to behaviors through experiential learning.

This study found that the NEP (Children@School) can be used to evaluate the efficacy of architectural design strategies -- such as the inclusion of visible ESD features -- for improving children's attitudes to the natural environment. While there are many environmental education programs and tools for evaluating such programs, few studies have focused on how to evaluate the impact of the learning contexts for such programs. This study addresses this concern and calls attention to the fact that the design of school learning spaces can be used as a pedagogic tool for promoting environmental education goals.