Bringing nature back to cities and children back to… nature? How environmental education in a renovated urban park reshapes children’s representations

While sustainable urban planning seeks to bring nature back to cities by developing urban parks, environmental education programmes (EEP) use these parks to bring children back to nature. This research investigated 7-year-old children’s representations of a renovated urban park in Lyon (France). It focused on children’s social representations of the park: (1) by observing the children’s negotiated experiences with nature during an EEP, and (2) by analysing their drawings of the park before and after the programme and comparing these with drawings made by children who were not part of the programme. The results show that the park was mainly represented by the children as a playground, and not as a place of nature. However, the EEP challenged this representation: the experiences with nature offered by the programme interacted with the physical characteristics of the park, which was represented as a green urban space to enjoy with others.