Scaffolding Children's Participation in Schools' Environmental Health: The Role of Teacher Mediation and Digital Tools

Background

The concept of environmental health is centered on creating health-supportive environments and encompasses the assessment and control of the environmental factors that can potentially affect health (World Health Organization [WHO], 2018). The Eco-Sensors4Health project, and the research presented in this paper, aim at improving environmental health in schools, through the assessment of environmental health problems by children and through children’s intervention on related environmental factors that may affect health. In this project, daily ICT, such as digital sensors support children participation and eco-innovation, towards the creation of healthy and sustainable schools.

In the last decade, the use of sensors, namely sensors embedded in mobile devices, such as tablets and smartphones, has become ubiquitous, at all times and in all places (Sagl, & Resch, 2015). Citizens acquire information about their environment and publish it in diverse settings, such as social networks, platforms of voluntary geographic information projects, and citizen science projects, thus creating knowledge that influences decisions in social life, but also in political life and in science (Boulos, et al., 2011; Elwood, 2008; Laituri & Kodrich, 2008; Zook, Graham, Shelton, & Gorman, 2010).