Preschool children's mental models of the environment: A cross-level study

Abstract

This study, aiming to reveal preschool children's mental models of their environment, was carried out with the participation of 225 children aged 36–72 months attending 8 different preschool education institutions. It is based on qualitative research designed around a case study. The Word Association Test and Drawing were used as the data collection tools. In the study, it was observed that 36-48-month-old children mostly focused on the visuals they saw in the park (garden) and traffic in their environmental drawings, and in addition to these visuals, 49-60-month-old children included the forest in their environmental drawings, and 61-72-month-old children included home and school in their environmental drawings. The most prominent environments/elements observed with both data collection tools were the house, traffic, park, and sky for the 36–48-month-old children; house, traffic, park, sky, and rural-village for the 49–60-month-old children; and house, traffic, park, sky, rural-village, forest and nearby settlement (market, store, etc.) for the 61–72-month-old children. The common elements that children associate with the environment in their mental models are the concepts of house, traffic, park, and sky.