Natural History GCSE

No

1. Paragraphs 16 and 19 highlight the importance of ‘nature connectedness’ and yet paragraph 3 does not list improved nature connectedness as a subject aim. Wood, et.al., (2025) report that “People with higher human-nature connectedness have greater support for pro-environmental and pro-nature conservation behaviours, as well as higher wellbeing. Fostering greater human-nature connectedness through activities that environmental organisations facilitate can therefore help to inspire people to support conservation efforts.” The Natural History GCSE will enable schools to facilitate activities in class and in the field, increased nature connectedness may result from these activities, but it is not guaranteed. In fact, evidence shows that poorly designed and implemented activities can have the opposite effect on young people, especially teenagers. We recommend that ‘improved human-nature connectedness’ is included as an explicit aim of the GCSE.
2. Paragraph 3, bullet point 1: The use of the word ‘substantial’ is ambiguous. To have ‘substantial knowledge’ a student would need to acquire a large, solid, and well-informed understanding of Natural History. The proposed subject content is not broad enough to enable this. It would be misleading to tell students that the GCSE will give them ‘substantial knowledge’. It may be better to replace ‘substantial’ with ‘foundational.’ Furthermore, ‘experience’ could be added to knowledge in this aim, so that it reads ‘foundational knowledge and experience’.
3. Bullet point 6, paragraph 3, deals with climate change. The inclusion of this aim is welcome. However, if the aim is to ensure that students can demonstrate knowledge of ‘the measures that can be taken to manage and mitigate these impacts’ the choice of words ‘manage and mitigate’ need to be revisited, it is not clear what is meant by them. The specification includes knowledge of “human influences” on the natural world. It could also support students to critically evaluate how human activities (and wider systems shaping those activities) affect the natural world, and understand how these systems can change when people, communities and organisations work together to create better conditions for nature. At the moment Paragraph 13 is presented in a relatively binary way and could better reflect the complexity of human/nature relationships and the opportunities for change & nature recovery.
4. The Natural History GCSE should equip students with the confidence and agency to contribute positively, as active citizens, to nature recovery within their own communities, while understanding how local environmental issues connect to wider national and global systems and challenges.

Yes

1. ‘Uplands’ is missing from the list in paragraph 8. Students should gain an understanding of nature on land above the treeline.
2. Paragraph 10: We welcome the requirement for students to know and understand, ‘the interdependencies between different species in that habitat.’ This requirement will support the development of systems and ecological thinking. To extend this further, could students be required to know and understand the interdependencies between species in the habitat of study and other habitats they are in relationship with?
3. Paragraph 11: We welcome the requirement for students to know and understand ‘the response of wildlife to climate change as a result of (human and natural factors).’
4. Students should understand that the UK is widely recognised as one of the world's most nature-depleted countries and explore the historical, economic and cultural factors that have contributed to this. Understanding ecological decline is as important as understanding ecology itself. Students should not only understand how landscape have changed over time, but also that they can change and continue to change. Students must understand that the future of the natural world continues to be shaped by economic, cultural, and environmental factors and that people, including them, have agency to shape it individually and collectively.

No

1. The specification includes knowledge of “human influences” on the natural world. It could also support students to critically evaluate how human activities (and wider systems shaping those activities) affect the natural world, and understand how these systems can change when people, communities and organisations work together to create better conditions for nature. At the moment Paragraph 13 is presented in a relatively binary way and could better reflect the complexity of human/nature relationships and the opportunities for change and nature recovery.
2. Paragraph 13 begins with this sentence: “GCSE specifications in natural history must require students to know and understand the effect of human activities on wildlife and habitats and how the natural world can be preserved and supported.” We recommend adding to ‘preserved and supported’, so that students also learn how the natural world can be restored, regenerated, supported to adapt to climate change, and rewilded.
3. Paragraph 13, bullet point 1 lists human activities that effect the natural world. Numerous significant activities are not included: game hunting, fox hunting, littering and fly tipping, cultural landscape conservation, and road traffic (it is estimated that over a million mammals are killed or injured by vehicles on UK roads each year).
4. Paragraph 13, bullet point 1 lists ‘farming practice’ as a human activity that effects the natural world. The list in brackets could be expanded to include ‘diversification’ so that students gain an understanding of how farmland is being put to different uses, some of which have positive effects and others that don’t. We would also recommend the addition of ‘intensive’ and ‘manure spreading’ to this list.
5. Paragraph 13, bullet point 4 could add ‘historic films, documentaries, photographs, artworks, and books’ as resources that aid understanding of species and habitats.
6. Paragraph 13, bullet point 5: The ‘e.g.’ list in brackets could include ‘organic farming’, ‘nature-based adaptation to climate change’, ‘traffic calming and reduction’, ‘anti-litter action’. Emphasis should be on actions that have the largest impact, care needs to be taken not to mislead students on how impactful the measures listed are.
7. A requirement could be added to Paragraph 13 that emphasizes the important of students learning how to critically consider the human activities, rather than simply learning a list of measures. This should include critique of who has responsibility and power to act (individuals, communities, business and government) and the different ways citizens can participate in environmental decision-making.

No

1. The fieldwork requirement is very welcome. However, alongside this curriculum entitlement there should be measures in place to address equity of access. There is potential for major inequalities in how this qualification is experienced and questions remain over whether it is experienced at all based on the resources available to a school. To support equitable and high take up of the GCSE, we recommend that Department for Education put resources, training, and support in place to ensure all students, in all regions of England, have access this qualification.
2. Paragraph 17 states: “Awarding organisations must require evidence of this fieldwork being carried out, and the opportunity for students to reflect on their connection with nature.” This is welcome. We recommend adding more clarity to this sentence to make clear that opportunities must be given to students to allow them to reflect on their connection with nature. We also recommend adding ‘skills’ to ‘opportunities’ as students need learn how to reflect. Reflection activities should also extend beyond reflections on what has been learned in the field, students should be given the time and freedom, and equipped with the skills to reflect on how connecting with nature made them *feel*. To support the development of these reflection skills, teachers could expose students to examples of writers, artists, and musicians who have reflected on their relationship with nature over many centuries. The quality of student’s reflections on how connected to nature they feel should not be formally assessed, but it should be valued.
3. Whether or not the Natural History GCSE is achieving the aim of If ‘improved human-nature connectedness’ is included as an overall subject aim (as per our recommendation in answer to question 10) it is important to note that assessment of whether or not that aim has been achieved would not have to be done on a student by student basis. Instead, an independent research study of a statistically significant sample of students could be done using, for example, the Inclusion of Nature in Self scale (Mayer and Frantz, 2004) to assess whether the GCSE has had an effect on students taking the course.

Yes

1. Fieldwork is essential to the development of knowledge and understanding of the natural world, and quality experiences can improve feelings of nature connectedness. For a qualification on natural history, a minimum amount of time spent learning outdoors is important to ensure all students have frequent exposure to nature.
2. However, the proposed metric of 20 hours across two years raises some concerns. An hour-based requirement can unintentionally encourage schools to design fieldwork experiences that reward duration rather than learning quality. A highly engaging three-hour fieldtrip that immerses students in nature and learning activities may offer far greater educational value than five hours spent surveying their local park.
3. There is also a risk that schools capable of offering more fieldwork simply stop at 20 hours, treating it as a ceiling rather than a minimum. An hour-based requirement can help ensure that outdoor learning is prioritised, but it should be framed in a way that encourages more time in nature, not solely compliance with a low threshold.
4. There may be a need to provide in depth teacher training and education opportunities to ensure teachers are confident, expert and experienced in the design and delivery of high-quality fieldwork experiences. This training could be incorporated into the training on climate change, citizenship and sustainability education all teachers need.
5. There are complementary approaches that could strengthen the requirement. For example, schools could be required to revisit the same habit at least once each season. Another possibility would be to require students to conduct an independent ecological enquiry as a coursework exercise. Further, supporting students to correctly identify a specific number of plants or animal species in the field could further support learning outcomes as part of the fieldwork requirement.

Yes

Yes

No

The guidance on Page 11 is not clear and caused initial confusion.

Yes

This is much clearer than appendix 2.

Yes

1. We welcome the emphasis throughout the proposed subject content on habitats, interdependencies between species and first-hand fieldwork. Together, these provide an important opportunity to develop students' ecological intelligence. Professor Stephen Sterling has argued that one of the defining purposes of education in the twenty-first century should be to develop learners' capacity to think ecologically: to understand the world as a network of dynamic relationships and interdependencies, recognising that human societies are embedded within, and dependent upon, living systems.
2. We encourage the Department to make this ambition more explicit throughout the specification. The qualification should help students develop not only knowledge of species and habitats, but also an understanding of the ecological, social and economic systems that shape the natural world and influence environmental decision-making.
3. An important part of developing ecological intelligence is understanding the condition of nature in the UK. Students should learn that the UK is one of the world's most nature-depleted countries and explore the historical, cultural and economic reasons why this has happened. Without this wider context, students risk learning about British wildlife without understanding the scale and significance of the challenges it faces.
4. We also recommend greater attention to how society responds to environmental change. Alongside conservation and restoration, students should be introduced to contemporary concepts and debates such as biodiversity offsetting, enabling them to understand both its intended purpose and the arguments for and against its use. Likewise, there should be greater emphasis on climate adaptation, including nature-based adaptation, changing species distributions, altered migration patterns and the ways in which ecosystems are adapting to a changing climate.
5. The GCSE could do more to help students develop as global citizens by enabling them to understand connections between local ecosystems and wider global human systems – including consumption, production, trade, economics, geopolitics – and to recognise their capacity to participate in shaping those systems.
6. We encourage the Department to consider how the language used throughout the specification shapes students' understanding of the relationship between people and nature. Wherever possible, the qualification should avoid implying that humans exist separately from the natural world. Instead, it should consistently reinforce the understanding that people are part of nature and that human wellbeing depends upon healthy, functioning ecosystems. This perspective is fundamental to the development of ecological intelligence and would help distinguish this qualification as one that prepares students not only to understand nature, but also to understand humanity's place within it.
7. Finally, while we strongly welcome the introduction of a Natural History GCSE, it should not be regarded as the Government's primary response to improving nature education. As an optional qualification it will likely only be studied by a minority of young people, especially if DfE fails to put emphasis on (and resource behind) specific teacher training on Natural History. The GCSE should therefore sit alongside a broader commitment to ensuring that all children have regular opportunities to learn in, through, about and for nature throughout their education.

Yes

The proposed subject content has the potential to have a disproportionate impact on some groups if appropriate support is not provided during implementation.

1. Students with disabilities or certain health conditions may face barriers to participating in some forms of fieldwork. This should not prevent them from accessing the qualification. Awarding organisations should ensure that fieldwork requirements are sufficiently flexible and that reasonable adjustments can be made while preserving the educational value of first-hand engagement with nature.
2. Schools serving disadvantaged communities often have less access to transport, outdoor learning budgets and nearby high-quality natural environments. If the GCSE is to be genuinely accessible, consideration should be given to implementation support so that students' opportunities are not determined by their school's financial circumstances or geographical location.
3. The proposed emphasis on local habitats is welcome. It has the potential to improve equality of opportunity. It enables schools to make use of nearby green spaces rather than relying on expensive residential visits or specialist field centres. We recommend that the guidance makes clear that valuable natural history fieldwork can take place in a wide variety of settings, including school grounds, parks and urban habitats.
4. The GCSE presents an opportunity to reduce inequalities in young people's access to meaningful experiences of nature. To maximise this possibility opportunities to study the GCSE need to genuinely be open to all and not dependent on where a student lives or the resources available to their school. This consideration should be core to the design of the course.

1. The proposed subject content should encourage awarding organisations to ensure that the people and case studies students encounter reflect the diversity of those who have contributed to the understanding, conservation and restoration of the natural world. Natural history has historically been presented through a relatively narrow lens. For example, in the UK, heterosexual white male and female presenters such as Sir David Attenborough, Chris Packham, Michaela Strachan, Kate Humble, Andy Day and Steve Backshall dominate in the Natural History TV world. The field is, however, slowly diversifying in the UK with emergence of Liz Bonnin, Gillian Burke and Hamza Yassin (Ranger Hamza), but much effort still needs to be made to ensure students learn from, and about the contributions of, people from different cultures, ethnic backgrounds, genders and communities. It is vital that students are supported to access knowledge held by Indigenous peoples and gain an understanding of different ways of knowing. This would help all students see themselves reflected in the history of Natural History while also developing a more accurate understanding of how knowledge of the natural world has been generated. Indigenous perspectives should not, however, be presented as an addition to predominantly Western account of Natural History that often still frame humans as separate from nature.
2. Care should also be taken to ensure that fieldwork guidance and assessment arrangements are inclusive for disabled students and that reasonable adjustments enable meaningful participation wherever possible, without diminishing the educational value of first-hand engagement with nature.

Yes

Over the medium to long term the GCSE could have significant positive effects on all of the issues listed. The scale of the affect will depend on how many students take the course and what they go on to do as citizens and consumers for the rest of their lives. There is a danger, however, that the Natural History GCSE’s content and focus, with its comparative lack of emphasis on climate change and nature degradation, will contribute to prevailing misunderstanding of how much action needs to be taken to tackle climate change and nature loss. This would create an overall negative effect and must be strongly guarded against. There is, therefore, a clear need to develop student’s ability to critically engage as active citizens with real environmental decisions.

To counter this, the subject content could be designed to explicitly introduce students to the environmental principles themselves or the way they inform environmental policy and decision-making. Currently, there does not seem to be enough opportunity for students to consider concepts such as the ‘precautionary principle’’ or the ‘polluter pays’ principle when studying environmental issues and responses. There is a clear need to give students the opportunity to understand how systems that protect, steward, and harm the natural world are developed and how they can contribute to shaping and improving these systems throughout their lives. 

We recommend that the subject content explicitly encourages students to explore how these principles are applied in practice through relevant case studies and fieldtrips. This would strengthen students' understanding of how scientific knowledge, environmental ethics and public policy interact when addressing nature loss and climate change.