This article considers the knowledge students (ages 6, 10, and 15 years) have of animals from a cross-cultural perspective. Students from six countries (Brazil, England, Finland, Iceland, Portugal, and the United States of America) were asked to free-list as many animals as possible and state where they had seen or learned about the animals. The results were analyzed and they indicate that 1) Students are aware of animals. 2) Students are more aware of mammals as examples of animals. 3) There is a globally shared folk biological knowledge of animals. 4) Students learn about animals during sociocultural interactions. The educational implications are discussed.

Textbook analysis is seen as a major element for studying environmental education addressing pupils, image analysis being rather relevant when studying textbooks written in 11 languages. We analysed 25 textbooks from 14 countries addressed to 14–16-year-old pupils, focusing on: (1) local and foreign/global images; (2) urban/rural and nature images; (3) negative impact, human management, and the beauty of nature; and (4) men and women in images with negative and positive impact. We distinguished some trends between Western (WEc) and Eastern (EEc) European countries and non-European countries (NEc). In contrast to textbooks from EEc and NEc, which tend to show the beauty of nature with little human influence, WEc textbooks tend to exhibit more images of urban/rural landscape, of human negative impact and of human management, expressing an anthropocentric view of the environment. Men are usually more present in textbook images than women. However, some images exhibiting more women than men could be found in textbooks from WEc and EEc, but never in NEc. In negative impact pictures, men are more often present than women but NEc women are never present in such images. Women are more frequent than men in positive impact images. Results suggest that textbooks from EEc and NEc should give more emphasis to human management and urban/rural images, whereas those from WEc should give more attention to the beauty of nature. A balance in the presence of men and women in images should be a matter of greater concern by all textbooks’ authors and publishers.

Environmental education has been seen as a basic tool to contribute to the change of conceptions, values and attitudes. Textbook analysis is a major element in the evaluation of how the educational goals (at the legislative level of national programmes) are implemented at the school level. The aim of the present study was to analyse the progression of the topic Pollution along the 12 years of Portuguese primary and secondary schools, since the first year (5/6 years old) up to the 12th school year (16/17 years old), giving special attention to the ‘Impact on humankind’, ‘Economic consequences’, ‘Social risks’, ‘Aesthetic values’ and ‘Ethical, moral and cultural motivations’. Results showed that: (1) the planet is seen as a resource for humankind instead of a resource shared with other living beings; (2) it is given a stronger reliance on technologies in sustainable development rather than to changes of individual and social behaviour; and (3) it is conferred unlimited trust in science and technology solutions instead of using the principle of precaution. This study shows that a change of textbooks is recommended in order to give more emphasis to the human role in solving the pollution problems and contributing to improve pupils'; citizenship.

O bloco curricular À descoberta do ambiente natural, do 4º ano de escolaridade do ensino primário, abrange temáticas e/ou estratégias de outdoor learning. O ensino em contexto não formal é proporcionador de aprendizagens significativas que podem desenvolver atitudes e valores de respeito para e/ou preservação da natureza e sensibilização para os aspetos estéticos do ambiente. O meio natural necessita que a educação ambiental desencadeie sentimentos ecocêntricos nas nossas crianças, de modo a que cesse a perspetiva antropocêntrica em relação ao meio ambiente. Assim, tomando como problema de investigação perceber se estas crianças do ensino primário conheciam o recurso natural do meio onde residem, o rio Zêzere, desenvolvemos um estudo qualitatito/quantitativo, por questionário. Face aos resultatos obtidos construímos e validámos um recurso didático, um guião, cuja finalidade é a descoberta deste recurso natural através de uma atividade de outdoor.