One of the key tasks of the Kozjanski Park employees is to educate pupils, students and adults, to encourage nature protection with the emphasis on maintaining biodiversity and protecting valuable natural features. Pupils, mostly from schools in the surrounding area, explore their local environment, their existent knowledge, reach new discoveries, and are actively involved in the educational process in which they gain personal experience. Work with the young in Kozjanski park is organised in the form of days out in nature, culture days, summer camps, theme days, different workshops and learning paths. The master's thesis discusses the proposed activites organised by Kozjanski Park in view of nature protection education of the pupils of six primary schools located in the park area. The theoretical part presents the natural heritage (valuable natural features), the history of Kozjanski Park, its geographical features, natural and cultural heritage and the informal educational programmes and activities in Kozjanski Park that are intended for students on all levels of education and other visitors. It also presents the importance of protected areas in educational processes and some components of active studying and teaching.
The information for the empirical part of the research were gathered through interviews with the Kozjanski Park employees, primary school teachers, pupil questionnaires and tests and the curricula of the compulsory subjects of elementary school. I conclude that there are differences in knowledge and attitude to nature and natural heritage of Kozjanski Park among students of different age groups. I also conclude that there is a positive correlation between the knowledge of students and their overall shool performance and grades in biology and science. On the other hand, there is no correlation between students' attitude to nature and the natural heritage of Kozjanski Park according to students' overall school preformance and grades in biology and science. I also recognize that students' attitude to biology as a school subject is not related with students' overall school performance and grades in biology and science. There is a significant representation of contents and operational educational objectives in the areas of nature protection, protected areas, parks and natural and cultural heritage in the curricula of some primary school subjects. Most of these operational objectives are met by pupils in biology, geography and science classes.
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