Informal Education of Energy Conservation: Theory, Promotion, and Policy Implication

Since there is about seventy percent of population in Taiwan acquiring knowledge of energy conservation through informal education, the non-school based energy education is growing more important. In this paper a brief survey of informal education of energy conservation in Taiwan is conducted. First of all, a variety of instructional scenarios available for informal education are reviewed, including museums, communities, and many others. Secondly, the strategies to promote informal education, such as TV ads, print media advertising, network communication, speaking tour, leaflet distribution, workshop, demonstrations, eco-tour, community colleges, and prize events, are discussed based on cost-benefit analysis. Furthermore, the influence of each strategy on the population’s knowledge of energy conservation is estimated statistically. The effectiveness of different types of informal education is compared based on their economic cost, learning outcome, and acceptance rate. As a conclusion, a suggestion to improve the energy education policy is proposed. This study has been devoted to finding the curriculum theories and strategies applicable in designing curriculum for informal education, and to providing a theoretical basis on which environmental protection education curriculum can be developed.