Cross Breeds

Can someone explain the paragrapher in simpler terms please? Its about the tropical rainforest?

This study analysed 9 to 11 year old children's drawings of tropical rainforests immediately before and after a visit to the Humid Tropics Biome at the Eden Project, Cornwall, UK. A theoretical framework derived from considerations of informal learning and constructivism was used as a basis to develop a methodology to interpret the children's drawings and to measure the change in children's perceptions and learning after their visit. The children's pre-visit drawings mainly showed tree and plant outlines familiar to an English countryside. Rainforest animals were to the fore in the pictures and there was a general lack of scale, depth and perspective in the drawings. In the post-visit drawings, the animals had mainly disappeared. There was often remarkable accuracy in the shape and detail of the tropical rainforest trees and plants now drawn. The post-visit drawings also demonstrated far greater depth, scale and perspective than the pre-visit drawings. The interpretation and analysis of the drawings gave insights into children's understanding and learning about tropical rainforests and demonstrated that analysis of children's drawings can be an effective method of assessing some aspects of their learning. Just need it broken down in simpler terms...thank you

Public Comments

1. This actually looks like a poor study. Where are the groups of children whose ***first** drawings were done after they visited the Biome project?.... presumably some sort of museum/diarama. So the students in the project had two chances to draw the same theme. But this time they were apparently given a 3D view of the tropics. No wonder they showed a greater sense of depth of field, etc. I wonder what would have happened if a group had done the initial drawing..... and then the same time later, without visiting the Biome project, have been asked to redraw on the same topic. Would their first drawing experience make them better drawers? Taken the study at face value, they saw through the drawings of students a greater environmental perception of the tropics, and the botanical aspect of the system after their field trip to the Eden Project, and argue it's a good evaluation tool for learning..... but the weaknesses of this particular study, at least as you present the methodology, makes it difficult to argue specific points.