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Contemporary society is shaped by the idea that time is, above all, a scarce economic resource that must be used efficiently – “time is money” not to be wasted. Increasingly, however, scientific findings suggest that such a way of perceiving of time seems a major cause of the current global climate and sustainability crisis. So far, this research has often focused on mobility, energy consumption, or the structural conditions of the social organisation of time. Considerably less work has been carried out in relation to the role of individual time-related needs regarding unsustainable consumption behaviour, although consumer research has been addressing needs-oriented approaches to sustainable consumption for a long time. Environmental and Sustainability Education (ESE) is considered an essential strategy to achieve the global sustainability goals of Agenda 2030. Internationally, as well as on a national level, ESE is increasingly mainstreamed in educational curricula and practice, including in Germany. Given the relation between time, needs and sustainability, it appears valuable to inquire into this field from the perspective of ESE – where time as a resource for sustainability has received comparatively little attention so far. The core research interest of this cumulative dissertation is therefore the question of how the connection between time, our needs and sustainability can be conveyed through pedagogical approaches. The inquiry used an exploratory, qualitative research design to address this question. In a first step, the concept of sustainability-related time use competence was developed. This then served as a guiding concept for the understanding of time used in this work and as the overall objective for the educational intervention developed and piloted as part of the research. Next, a content analysis of German curricula was conducted with the aim of determining whether and to what extent these address the relation between time and sustainability. The results show curricula contain only a few starting points that encourage a connection between time and sustainability in school lessons. The study further indicates that an understanding of time as a scarce resource to be used efficiently has prevailed in school contexts so far. Accordingly, pedagogical approaches to time often focus heavily on time management. The next step involved developing and piloting a time use competence curriculum in cooperation with three partner schools, using an Action Research Approach. This intervention followed the pedagogical approach of Self-Inquiry Based Learning (SIBL) seeking to sensitise learners to the relation between individual needs and consumer behaviour. During implementation, which lasted one semester, students logged their time, were encouraged to reflect on their personal needs, and subsequently implement individual change projects related to time use. This was embedded in continuous reflective individual and group exercises. The results strengthen the hypothesis that there is a relation between time use and sustainability. Furthermore, the pedagogical approach of SIBL has proven suitable to enable students to reflect on their time use and to raise their awareness of the role of individual needs. Participants reported that changes in time use did indeed increase their personal well-being. This, according to existing evidence from sustainability science, has been found to potentially lead to more sustainable behaviour. At the same time, previous research found that behavioural changes that lead to an increase in well-being do not automatically lead to more sustainable consumption behaviour. Rather, personal attitudes and motivation regarding sustainability are important. This suggests that future ESE interventions aiming at changes in time use should always also contain sufficient opportunities for reflection of values and motives. A third empirical study was carried out, inquiring into students’ time use during the eriod of COVID-19-induced school closures, using a Grounded Theory Approach. Since the pandemic disrupted young peoples’ routines drastically, the research focused on which kinds of learning experiences students made during this time and which insights can be derived for ESE. The results of the semi-structured interviews with 69 participants show first that the narrative of students’ learning loss, which is predominant in the current educational science, policy, and media discussion, falls short. Instead, a variety of learning experiences are revealed, such as learning one’s own learning and everyday rhythms or creatively adapting consumption habits to the new situation of “lockdown”. Overall, a key finding of this work is that students are currently unable to adequately realise their time-related needs. In view of the findings from research on time and sustainability, one recommendation is therefore that everyday school life could give students more space to organise their time according to their needs. This might be done through pedagogical measures in the classroom, but would also require a stronger institutional anchoring, for example, within the framework of the Whole Institution Approach to Sustainability (WIA), to bring about lasting changes. Furthermore, it would be advisable to give the topic of time in connection with sustainability more space in curricula and in teacher training. This gives rise to future research needs, such as the need to explore how time use competence can be included into everyday pedagogical practice, for instance, by adapting the SIBL approach piloted in a school setting here. It would also call for longitudinal research designs, and it would be of interest to research how time use competence might be incorporated into school development processes. Given the ongoing debate about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on schools and education in general, the findings of the research can stimulate both further research and future ESE practice. The experiences during the pandemic have shown that schools and all actors involved including students and teachers, are so far insufficiently prepared to handle crises. Here, the approach to time use competence piloted in this work can offer valuable stimulations for ESE research and practice. This is especially true since it is compatible with existing approaches to key competencies for sustainability by seeking to complement them with a stronger focus on individual, needs-oriented time shaping.
