Evaluation of educational content and practices on biodiversity and bio-smuggling in line with sustainable development goals

This study aims to reveal the cognitive structures of middle school students about biodiversity and bio-smuggling and to examine their views on the teaching process developed in this direction. A holistic single case study design was used as a qualitative research method. The study group of the research consists of 21 students studying in the 5th grade of a secondary school in Karatay District of Konya province in the first semester of the 2023-2024 academic year. A 6-week training process on biodiversity and bio-smuggling was designed and implemented. In the educational process, teaching materials prepared with Powtoon, one of the Web 2.0 tools, were shared interactively with the students, and an educational trip was organized to Konya Tropical Butterfly Garden, Karatay Zoo, and Bahri Dağdaş International Agricultural Research Institute, which were selected as informal learning environments. As data collection tools, a word association test (WAT) consisting of 7 key concepts (Bio-smuggling, Biodiversity, Endemic Species, Ecosystem, Global Warming, Endangered Species, and Sustainable Development) and a semi-structured interview form was used. The WAT data were transferred to the concept network after the frequency table was created and analyzed with the breakpoint technique. Content analysis was performed on the data obtained from the semi-structured interview form. The results of the study revealed that students' cognitively misconstructed perceptions and images were improved, the national and local biological richness of our country should be perceived as a national value, and their awareness of the problem of bio-smuggling was improved. Among the value-added results of the research are that students' Anthropocene approaches towards biodiversity evolved towards an ecocentric approach and they realized that they should have a national stance towards the problem of bio-smuggling. At the end of the research, recommendations were made for researchers and educators who want to work on biodiversity and bio-smuggling.