Conceptions and dimensions of quality in environmental and sustainability education

How is quality conceptualised within Environmental and Sustainability Education (ESE)? In this study, we report on a small-scale scoping review of a corpus of articles published in Environmental Education Research that explicitly addressed notions of teaching quality and the quality of teaching. The analytical framework is based on a multidimensional model which distinguishes between three aspects and dimensions: prescribed, experienced, and documented qualities of teaching. The framework guides our thematic reading of the literature, while our analysis unpacks how different conceptions and dimensions of quality are represented in the corpus, alongside which perspectives are underrepresented. While the findings indicate that all three dimensions can be found, most studies focus on teachers, pre-service teachers, school leaders, and other school stakeholders. Equally, research involving students’ perspectives appears less frequently, as do investigations of experienced quality in relation to ESE. We conclude with a discussion of how these underrepresented gaps can be addressed in future research, with an emphasis on the importance of exploring and including students’ notions and experiences of quality.