Direct contact with live animals places students in the centre of the learning process, allowing them to develop a more authentic understanding of life. The experience provides them with insights that cannot be gained just with visual means, such as photographs or videos. By engaging multiple senses, children develop a deeper understanding of animals’ life needs and life processes, while also fostering emotional responses that motivate learning.
The master’s thesis examines the use of live animals in primary school science lessons, focusing on the experiences and opinions of classroom teachers in Slovenian schools in Italy and Slovenia with respect to the inclusion of live animals in their teaching. With the use of a questionnaire, we gained insights into current practices in both regions and found that teachers rarely incorporate live animals into their lessons, despite recognising multiple positive effects like increased student motivation, the encouragement of active learning, and the development of empathy and observational science skills. Organisational factors, financial costs, the limited availability of live animals, along with concerns about hygiene and allergies were identified as barriers to including live animals in lessons.
Further, we investigated how direct experience influences students’ knowledge and their relationship with animals, specifically the common toad. To that end, we designed two lessons: one in which students interacted with a live toad (experiential learning) and another in which we used only images and videos of a toad (traditional, transmission-based teaching). The study involved students from two 4th-grade classes. One class was the experimental group while the other was the control group. Before the lessons, students completed a questionnaire to allow us to assess their prior knowledge and attitudes to toads. In the experimental group, the lesson focused on direct interaction with the live animal, while the control group were given the same content, except solely with images and videos. Students completed the same questionnaire once again 1 day as well as 4 weeks after the lessons. We established that students who had direct contact with the toad developed a significantly more positive attitude toward the animal, which was maintained over time. In contrast, students without this experience showed no such changes. Knowledge about toads improved significantly in both groups after the lesson, and there were no significant differences between the groups. However, we observed that intense emotional reactions in the presence of such animals can temporarily make students less able to focus on acquiring new information.
In addition, we explored whether the impact of experiential learning extends beyond the classroom and can be seen in the children’s home environment. A questionnaire completed by the parents of the study participants revealed that those students who had direct contact with the toad showed greater interest in the animal at home compared to those missing this experience. Parents acknowledged the positive effects of interactions with animals on child development and expressed a desire for their children to participate in other activities involving live animals at school. Moreover, they were willing to contribute to the care of animals kept by the school, both organisationally and financially.
The results of our research lead us to recommend that live animals be included in educational programmes, teacher training be improved, and the necessary resources provided to ensure the safe and effective use of live animals in teaching. These approaches benefit not only children but also add to a sustainable understanding of the world, as parents, teachers, and the broader community work together to foster a responsible relationship with nature and life in all of its forms.
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