Estudo etnobotânico na educação básica: tradição e saber popular no processo de ensino - aprendizagem

Abstract

Ethnobotany represents the study of human relationships with plants and their ecological, evolutionary and cultural interactions, taking into account the most varied forms of use given to plants. This study aimed to carry out a survey of plants used by students and family members of a federal school in São Luís - Maranhão, highlighting the therapeutic indication, part used, and the method of preparation and use of medicines, through the body systems in which they work, thus promoting the registration of popular knowledge on the subject, in addition to serving as a motivation for the teaching of botany in the biology discipline of that school. The application of the Investigative Sequence was carried out with a 2nd/3rd high school/technician class, initially remotely through the Google Meet application, where discussions on botany and Ethnobotany of medicinal plants were held, seeking to explore the knowledge that students had. about phytotherapic plants, seeking to record the knowledge experienced at home within the family axis. The data collection was carried out through the application of questionnaires with the students where we had 39 species of plants mentioned, distributed in 26 botanical families and interviews with their respective guardians where 58 species of plants were mentioned, distributed in 28 botanical families. When we related the plants mentioned by the students and their guardians, we verified a similarity above 64.11%, showing that the knowledge about medicinal plants that these students carry is probably from the information passed on by their families and that, therefore, such knowledge needs to be preserved in a educational context, as it allows a link between popular and scientific knowledge, in addition to documenting the rich popular knowledge on the subject. The data from these questionnaires and interviews were tabulated and analyzed in a qualitative and quantitative way and were used to create beds of medicinal plants in the school itself and also in the elaboration of a medicinal booklet from the data extracted from the plants mentioned by the students and their guardians in the questionnaires and interviews applied by the students themselves regarding medicinal vegetables grown in their respective backyards. Among others, the results showed that the vast majority of students participating in the Investigative Sequence already had knowledge of the therapeutic functions of plants and that this knowledge was acquired from people in their family life, justifying that due to its benefits and cultural importance, the knowledge about medicinal plants should not be abandoned, since the vast majority of medicinal plants serve as a primary source for new medicines, therefore, their study can be of great importance for the entire population. Another important point to be highlighted is that this Ethnobotany research served and still serves as an excellent motivator in the teaching of botany in the disciplines of science and biology, especially if we consider that investigative teaching in Natural Sciences encourages the student to identify problems, propose hypotheses and seek explanations, as it enabled an exchange of knowledge between the school, students and their families as emphasized by the BNCC.