THE KNOWLEDGE ABOUT WILD AND DOMESTIC ANIMALS FROM YOUNG STUDENTS FROM TAUBATE SCHOOLS

Abstract

This research aims at analyzing in which way the biological sciences, more specifically about wild and domestic animals, are recognized by young children, through their school experiences and their way of live. For this reason, this study was developed during 2005 with seven to nine-year-old children, from public and private school in Taubaté. Two hundred and fifties enquiries were collected and analyzed from children that have already taken part of an extension project called: “Nature and Children: learning with animals and plants”, sponsored by Universidade de Taubaté, where university students from different courses could participate by visiting the selected school performing some activities. One of these activities was the presentation of two pictures: one of a big forest and another of an urban scene. At this moment was possible to obtain from children the answers for the following question: “What animals live in each environment?” The general results were: 225 answers indicating monkey living in the forest habitat and 210 answers indicating dogs living in the urban habitat. It was possible to observe that the answers from children of both schools showed an increasing of other domestic animals to the urban habitat and an decreasing of wild animals to this same pictures. So, we concluded that the animals children declared in each habitat are those which are known from TV programs, cartoons and other media means.