Promoting the conservation of watershed forestry among environmental education students at the faculty of environment and resource studies

Abstract

The comparative knowledge in the conservation of watershed forestry of students majoring in Environmental Education was evaluated and compared the attitudes of students towards the conservation of watershed forestry. The 30 senior students majoring in Environmental Education at the Faculty of Environment and Resource Studies, Mahasarakham University was sampling and they were volunteered to participate in the evaluation. The research instruments comprised a manual on the conservation of watershed forestry, a leaflet on the conservation of watershed forestry. The test on the conservation of watershed forestry was a multiple-choice test consisted of 20 items in each four choices and an attitude test towards the conservation of watershed forestry comprising 10 items each with a 3-point response scale. Result showed that prior to participate in the conservation of watershed forestry, the student knowledge was assessed as the moderate level (=13.57) and identified as the high level (=17.60). Knowledge scores before and after their involvement in the conservation were compared and found significantly difference from each other at the P = 0.05.  Before they participated in the conservation of watershed forestry, the students’ attitude were rated as the ‘agreed’ level (=2.63), and still remained at the same level after their participation ended (=2.91). However, when compared to each other, these two figures showed the difference in student attitudes before and after their involvement in the conservation.