“ANIMAIS FANTÁSTICOS E ONDE HABITAM”: ENTRETENIMENTO, DIVERSÃO, MAGIA, EDUCAÇÃO E FORMAÇÃO AMBIENTAL

Abstract

One way to mitigate the various environmental problems would be to effectively reverse the current trend of ecosystem loss, promoting the restoration of the human connection with the environment and biodiversity, based on continuous and integrative activities involving environmental education and conservation education in all the stages and levels of schooling. In this sense, we aim to evaluate the viability of using a fantasy film ("Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them") and box office success as a didactic resource that can contribute to the pro-environmental training of young students. To this end, students from the 6th grade of a public school (GO, Brazil) watched the film (step 1) and participated sequentially in an educational activity that used the background of the Brazilian Cerrado biome (step 2). Our data demonstrate that the students who participated in the two stages of the study presented a significant gain in knowledge on different environmental themes, such as biodiversity, ecology, biome peculiarities, environmental impacts and trafficking of wild animals; unlike those who did not participate in the activities, from those who only watched the film (stage 1) and from those who only participated in stage 2. Therefore, our study provides, first of all, evidence that the film "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them" although it may not please the general public, presents screenplay, production, plot, scenarios, film space, characters and audiovisual effects that can be explored as a powerful tool in the environmental education field. In addition, our data is a good example of the potential of this film for the exploration of conservation issues relating to different planetary natural resources.