Brazilian elementary school students’ social representations of marine biodiversity

Abstract

Education needs to address scientific and technological activities in order to provide students with means of understanding and evaluating their influences on various parameters that characterize society. In this sense, education from the Science, Technology and Society (STS) perspective can promote the adoption of values ​​and attitudes that allow them to interpret and position themselves in the face of these activities taking into account the effects of globalization, production and consumption systems and the need to transform social and environmental reality, seeking a better quality of life and sustainability. Therefore, the investigation in question aims to identify the Social Representation (RS) of basic education students about the marine environment, using the contributions of Moscovici and the central core theory proposed by Abric. From a methodological point of view, we sought to identify the SR of 299 students aged between 11 and 16 years, regularly enrolled in the 7th grade, 8th grade and 9 grade of elementary school, in two Brazilian schools. As a data collection instrument, students had to answer the following question: When thinking about the seas and oceans, what are the first six words that come to mind? From the data analysis it was noticed that even though Brazil is a country known for having an extensive coastal area, the students’ responses reveal the existence of a considerable distance in relation to such an environment.