Islamic Ecological Values in Religious Education: A Case Study of Environmental Awareness in an Indonesian Senior High School
Abstract
This qualitative case study examined how Islamic ecological values are integrated into Islamic Religious Education (PAI) at a public senior high school in Bengkulu City, Indonesia, and how this integration relates to students’ Islamic environmental awareness - defined here as a cognitive understanding of Islamic ecological principles combined with an affective, religiously grounded sense of responsibility toward the natural world, which may or may not yet be expressed in consistent behavioural conduct. Data were collected from one PAI teacher and ten grade-ten students (identified by codes to protect their identities) through semi-structured interviews, six classroom observations, and document analysis, and were analysed using Miles, Huberman, and Saldaña’s interactive model, combining deductive coding around five Islamic ecological principles (tauhid, khilafah, amanah, mizan, and the prohibition of fasad fil ardh) and four Contextual Teaching and Learning (CTL) indicators with inductive coding of emergent themes. Findings show that the teacher enacted four interlocking pedagogical strategies - contextual Qur’anic-Hadith linkage, Socratic discussion, project-based tasks, and modelling/habituation - that were associated with students’ progressive movement from cognitive understanding toward affective engagement and, unevenly, toward behavioural enactment of environmentally responsible conduct. The study proposes a provisional Islamic Ecological Pedagogy (IEP) framework, comprising theological grounding, contextual pedagogical mediation, and institutional habituation, derived from this single case and warranting further validation. Given the purposive single-site design, findings are presented as context-bound illustrations rather than generalisable claims. Implications for PAI curriculum development, teacher preparation, and school-based ecological habituation are discussed as considerations for future policy and practice rather than as established recommendations.
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