The achievement of flora literacy in secondary school students within nature observation and educational cards

The human being live in a selfish way as if they are the only creatures in the World and this situation harms the environment. As the situation continues, it is inevitable that environmental problems will increase and affect our lives as well as other living creatures. In order to prevent these behaviors, it is a necessity to provide environmental education. The children become the adults of the future. That's why, the education to be given to children can improve the situation about environmental problems in the future. Environmental education should not only consist of theoretical knowledge. Learning by doing activities such as nature observation and out of school environmental activities are more permanent. These activities which are related with enviroment can be used with the subjects of flora, fauna, recycling and environmental problems. In this study, it is aimed to provide students' flora literacy by the nature observation and sensory and mental exploration activities with educational cards. The design of the research is action research metod. The study was accomplished with the participation of 6-A class students (n=20) of the secondary school in Muğla, Dalaman in the 2019-2020 academic year. Before the research, flora literacy test, observation form, worksheets, and out-of-school environmental education activities were created. Data were collected through flora literacy test, activity diary, observation form, worksheets and educational card activities. As a product of the out-of-school environmental education activities, plant cards and plant calendars were created with the students. Data were collected with Wilcoxon signed-rank test (Wilcoxon matched-pairs test) and analyzed with descriptive analysis. After the activities, a significant difference was found in favor of the post-test in the flora literacy test and flora literacy about knowledge test of the students. In addition, there was no significant difference in the flora literacy about attitude and behavior tests of the students. Descriptive analyzes show that there are students who have positive attitudes and behaviors about flora after the activities. It was revealed with the research that the flora literacy of the students improved with the nature observation activities. Keywords: environmental education, flora literacy (botanical literacy), nature observation, educational card