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The River Guardian Program for Junior High Schools on the “River of Kings,” Thailand

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Learning Geography Beyond the Traditional Classroom

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Abstract

A country’s main river is like the central bloodline sustaining the majority of people who live there. The Chao Phraya River is Thailand’s main river, running through Ayutthaya, Thonburi, and Rattanakosin or Bangkok, three important capital cities from the days of Siam to present-day Thailand. Over time, our relationship with this river has changed and our actions have degraded it. Pollution, canal building, and damming have contributed to ecosystem changes. The best way to try to conserve our main river is to enable new generations to learn about and to love their own resource. With this desire in mind, the River Guardians Project was created. The River Guardians Project is one of the programs administered by Traidhos Three Generation Barge Program (http://barge.threegeneration.org/), working in the field of education for sustainability at different locations in Thailand. A group of five Thailand government junior high schools (M1-M3 level, or 13–15-year-olds) in Bangkok were identified and trained to test the water quality in their section of the river, going from near the city boundary, downstream, to the heart of the city. Dissolved oxygen (DO), biochemical oxygen demand (BOD5), E. coli, nitrate (N), phosphate (P), pH, water temperature, total dissolved solids (TDS), and turbidity were analyzed as representative parameters for the quality of the river in this research. Trends in water quality were observed particularly in relation to local land use patterns. Although coordination with the schools at times can be challenging, overall the teachers felt that the students have benefited from the experience academically and it has given them an appreciation for the connection of water and community. The Education for Sustainable Development philosophy behind the program, the logistics of creating the program, water quality testing results, and lessons learned are presented in this chapter.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to express our sincere gratitude and deep appreciation to Mr. Ted Turkle for his vision in initiating and supporting this program through the SUNY Research Foundation. Special thanks to Mr. Kim Irvine to inspire me to work on this project. Furthermore, we would like to thank teachers and students from all the project schools who always worked hard to get the test result and for their warm coordination. I also would love to thank Lynda Rolph who supported me throughout this project. Finally, I also would like to thank all those who have been a part of this research who have not been mentioned.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Traidhos Three-Generation Community for Learning, Chiang Mai, Thailand

    Supitcha Kiatprajak & Lynda Rolph

Authors
  1. Supitcha Kiatprajak
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  2. Lynda Rolph
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Correspondence to Supitcha Kiatprajak or Lynda Rolph .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, Singapore

    Chew-Hung Chang

  2. National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei, Taiwan

    Bing Sheng Wu

  3. National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, Singapore

    Tricia Seow

  4. National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, Singapore

    Kim Irvine

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Kiatprajak, S., Rolph, L. (2018). The River Guardian Program for Junior High Schools on the “River of Kings,” Thailand. In: Chang, CH., Wu, B., Seow, T., Irvine, K. (eds) Learning Geography Beyond the Traditional Classroom. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-8705-9_6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-8705-9_6

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