Resumen

SCHWARZ, Maria Luiza; SEVEGNANI, Lúcia  y  ANDRE, Pierre. Representations of the Atlantic Rainforest and its biodiversity through children's drawings. Ciênc. educ. (Bauru) [online]. 2007, vol.13, n.3, pp. 369-388. ISSN 1980-850X.  http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S1516-73132007000300007.

Children drawings are useful and significant tools that can be used to evaluate their knowledge and the concepts of Science, their abilities and their opinions beyond their reasoning capacity. With their written explanations, 395 drawings done by children between the 6 and 14 years old, inhabitants of the Joinville urban area (SC, Brazil), were analyzed to test the knowledge of this social group on the Atlantic Rainforest and its biodiversity. More precisely, we analyzed the material for the ecosystem represented, and the diversity of the fauna and flora illustrated. Four themes in relation to the Atlantic Rainforest have been identified: "Its good condition of conservation", "Its bad state of conservation", "A comparative point of view between its good and bad state of conservation" and "Recommendations for its conservation". The results show that 60.2% of the participants had represented "good condition of conservation of Atlantic Mata".

Palabras llave : Atlantic Rainforest; Children; Social representations; Drawings; Biodiversity.