Estudo da cegueira botânica em uma escola pública do município de Cuité-PB.

Abstract

Plants play a fundamental role for the entire biosphere, being the primary producers in ecosystems, in addition to having multiple uses. However, despite the importance for our survival, we pay little attention to plants, and this inability to notice their presence in their natural environment is called botanical blindness. The teaching of botany is an important ally to overcome this problem, and it is fundamental to search for methodological alternatives for teaching the contents and that encourage interest in the plant area. Thus, the objective of the present work was to execute and analyze a didactic sequence and its potential for mitigating botanical blindness with students of the 1st year of high school at

Escola Cidadã Integral Orlando Venâncio do Santos, located in the municipality of Cuité- PB. A quali-quantitative approach study was carried out, with a sample of 18 students,

whose execution took place through a didactic sequence in the following steps: 1) Application of a previous questionnaire; 2) expository-dialogue class on the Caatinga biome; 3) application of a didactic resource, a comic book set in the Caatinga domain; 4) practical class of Plant Anatomy; 5) Application of a final evaluative questionnaire. From the analysis of the initial questionnaire, it was noticed a certain degree of botanical blindness in the students, evidenced by symptoms such as not noticing the presence of plants in a landscape, not knowing how to explain their importance and considering them less worthy of attention compared to others. animals. Subsequently, after applying the didactic sequence, it was noted, through the students' responses, a certain acquisition of important knowledge about mechanisms of Caatinga plants, mitigating symptoms of botanical blindness. In addition, for students, the stages of the didactic sequence made the contents less complex. In this way, it is believed that the planning and organization of the activities of the applied sequence enabled an interconnection between the students' prior knowledge and the knowledge learned, thus providing greater ease in learning botany content. Therefore, it is understood that this study achieved its objective, proposing a more active and contextualized teaching strategy, improving the teaching-learning process in botany, and therefore, mitigating the effects of botanical blindness.