Second edition of teachers' manual on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) concept integration

Component 3 of CODEP aims at raising environmental awareness and knowledge about desertification and other challenges among Mongolia's youth as well as the general public and intends changing behaviors.

Within this Component the first output is to support integration of ESD into primary and secondary education in Mongolia. Consequently in 2008 the Project supported an ESD Team, established by the Ministry of Education, Culture and Sciences, to develop a teacher's handbook on ESD integration for the first compulsory school year with the aim to have an appropriate tool for integrating ESD into teacher's training. The manual consists of 2 main pillars:

• 1st pillar - ESD concept and some relevant terms, how to integrate ESD at school and training activity lesson levels.
• 2nd pillar - how to integrate ESD concept into 1st grade training curriculum, some thematical cases of integration

Today a 2nd grade teachers' handbook is elaborated by the Team and now is ready for publishing. Soon special trainings on the use and importance of a manual will be organized. Using these manuals will help the teachers to obtain a common understanding about SD and ESD, integrate and implement ESD concept into training activities in order to further contribute to education renovation, that engages all the world today.

Education system in Mongolia shifted from 11 to 12 years. In relation to this a concept on the elaboration of new national curriculum was developed and its testing started from the 1st grade. According to the primary and secondary education policy on integrating ESD concept while developing new training curriculum there was a decision to promote ESD not as a separate lesson but to integrate it into all training curriculum of secondary schools.