Sustainability Tools I – Systems Thinking

This chapter focuses on one of the approaches that can be used to connect sustainability and chemistry concepts: systems thinking. Because systems thinking approaches are relatively new to the chemistry education community, this chapter begins with a description of the essential characteristics of a systems thinking approach, as well as a brief overview of potential benefits and challenges associated with the approach. The chapter then uses two sustainability contexts to show how systems thinking approaches can be integrated into chemistry teaching and learning: (1) ocean acidification to demonstrate how instructors can use the essential characteristics of a systems thinking approach to iteratively make existing chemistry lessons more systems thinking oriented, and (2) lithium-ion batteries to show how systems-oriented concept map extensions (SOCMEs) can be used to connect core chemical content to both planetary systems and real-world socio-scientific issues. The final section of this chapter provides recommendations related to initial attempts to integrate systems thinking approaches into chemistry courses.