PUPILS’ FACTUAL KNOWLEDGE ABOUT VERTEBRATE SPECIES

Biodiversity has become a challenging educational topic and basic knowledge about animal or plant species, their identification and life history has been targeted as a fundamental aspect. There are few studies aiming at assessing pupils' knowledge about vertebrates and it's identification skills in pupils. Further, many educational practitioners and conservationists claim a significant decrease of species knowledge in today's children and adolescents. Here, I try to quantify the knowledge about animal species using a large, illustrated questionnaire dealing with 54 vertebrate species. 879 lower secondary school pupils and 65 primary school pupils (4th graders) from three geographic regions throughout Germany participated in the study. Species knowledge was dependent on educational level and gender. It did not increase parallel to age or grade but rather reached a peak during the age of 14 years or during the 7th grade, respectively. Further, species knowledge did not decrease between the early 1980ies and 2005.