Different secondary school subject areas contributions to collaboration in environmental and sustainability teaching

According to the curricula in many countries, teachers in the subject areas of science, social science and language are expected to collaborate on cross-curricular issues such as sustainable development (SD). In Sweden this is the case in the nine-year compulsory school (Education, 2011). This study is based in Sweden and investigates the similarities and differences in the responses of ten teacher groups (forty-three teachers in total) to questions about their contributions in their own subject areas to environmental and sustainability education (ESE). There are previously some barriers identified to the implementation of ESE in a cross-curricular way. In a large quantitative study including about 3300 Swedish upper secondary teachers, comparisons were made regarding teachers inclusion of ESE within different subject areas (Borg, Gericke, Höglund, & Bergman, 2012). In that study it was found that language teachers do not always feel at ease with ESE teaching, and more than 41% of language teachers stated that they did not include SD issues in their teaching, while 34% stated (the highest percentage of the three subject areas) that they lacked the necessary knowledge expertise. In contrast, especially the social science teachers and to somewhat less degree the science teachers included this perspective. Regardless of the problems shown in previous studies the overall aim of this study is to understand what cross-curricular teaching in teacher teams can achieve in relation ESE. All teachers in compulsory school in Sweden are organized in cross-curricular teams of various subject teachers teaching the same student group, named lärarlag in Swedish and here denoted as teacher teams. Moreover, given that cross-curricular ESE teaching is stated as important in the Swedish curriculum, it is important to find out the potential possibilities for cross-curricular collaborations in ESE teaching. Are teachers already involved in collaborations, are they successful, and if s