Plants to the fore: Noticing plants in designed environments

Educational experiences where the ecological and social significance of plants is the main focus are crucial tools to help us to overcome “plant blindness” and challenge “zoocentric” views. By examining how student teachers respond to two different educational environments; one where animals are in the foreground, and another where plants take center stage, we conclude that for plants to be noticed in animal‐ rich environments, they need to be prominent in the design of spaces with informa‐ tion about them displayed clearly. This work will help inform the design and creation of tools that will enhance and develop plant science education.


| INTRODUC TI ON AND BACKG ROUND
Given the critical role of plants in sustaining life on Earth (Galbraith, 2003;Knapp, 2019;Raven, 2019), it is vital to motivate teaching and learning that can move students beyond the state of "plant blindness" (Wandersee & Schussler, 1999) via educational experiences where the ecological and social significance of plants is in focus. Wandersee and Schussler (1999) summarized their theory of plant blindness as "the inability to see or notice the plants in one's own environment".
More recently, Balding and Williams (2016) presented a review of research related to plant blindness in the context of the implications for plant conservation. In the period between the original publication of Wandersee and Schussler's theory and Balding and William's review, a substantial body of research work, in a range of disciplines, has contributed to diverse interpretations. Critically, for the current study, Balas and Momsen (2014) suggest that "whether plant blindness is normal and inevitable remains an open question; indeed, we might ask whether humans are blind to plants or simply more attentive to animals." In addition, the argument put forward by Sanders (2019), that the apparent "slowness" of plants could be one reason for not noticing them, might also be a factor.
Furthermore, a large body of educational research has concerned itself with the identification of plants and the perceived connections between knowledge of, and attitudes to, plants (e.g., Bebbington, 2005;Frisch, Unwin, & Saunders, 2010).
Multimodal approaches to teaching and learning science have been shown to be effective in engaging students (Ainsworth, Prain, & Tytler, 2011;Hartman, Lydon, & Rasmussen, 2019;Jewitt, Kress, Ogborn, & Tsatsarelis, 2001). Furthermore, science teaching appears to benefit from varied language practices through the use of metaphors and analogies, stories and models (e.g., Jewitt et al., 2001;Matruglio, Maton, & Martin, 2013;Wilson & Mant, 2011). Likewise, it has been shown that emotions and aesthetic experiences are involved in science teaching and learning (e.g., Jakobson & Wickman, 2008) and sensoric experiences might enrich students' experience of living organisms (Nyberg & Sanders, 2014). Various aesthetic plant characteristics, such as color, shape/size and smell, drew elementary students' attention in botanic garden studies conducted by Tunnicliffe (2001) and Sanders (2004) respectively. Moreover, special characteristics, such as survival-relevant knowledge about the plants have also been demonstrated to be important to plant-based education (Pany, 2014;Prokop & Fančovičová, 2014. In relation to varied environments Sanders (2007) for example, found that students' reasons for liking visits to zoos were that the organisms in themselves drew the children's attention, whereas at the botanic garden the reasons given for a positive experience related to the place, such as the activities they engaged in and "children's feelings" while being there. Studies of aesthetic experiences in museums (Mangione, 2016) demonstrate that aesthetic practices vary depending on how artifacts are made accessible, and exemplify how botanical gardens rely on multisensory affordances. These findings imply that multimodal and sensoric experiences might be significant for bringing about a shift from plant blindness toward noticing plants and their importance for life on earth.

| Aim and research questions
This study examined the educational affordances of sensory-rich indoor environments. We undertook a survey of student teachers in two different settings; the first, a science center, that featured living animals in the foreground; the second, a greenhouse in a botanical garden, that featured living plants in the foreground (Figure 1a,b).
We formulated the following open research questions to allow us to capture broad aspects of student teachers' experiences.
a What do the student teachers observe? b How do they describe their experiences?
The results presented here are part of a 3-year interdisciplinary but also how humans interact with their "plantness" (Darley, 1990).

| MATERIAL S AND ME THODS
The study took place in an enclosed rainforest setting at a science center, and in a greenhouse rainforest setting in a botanical garden in Gothenburg, the second largest city in Sweden. These indoor settings have different layouts. The rainforest at the science center consists of five levels, that begins with a recreation of a rainforest canopy that leads visitors down toward the ground, passing treedwelling and ground-dwelling animals and ending under water with an aquarium. In the botanical garden, the rainforest greenhouse is comparatively small, and visitors only see it from ground level, looking up toward the treetops. The greenhouse has exits to four more greenhouses with different botanical themes, so visitors can choose to break up the rainforest tour or experience it all in one go. Both settings serve to inform and teach about rainforests, but in different manners. The science center aims to attract a wide audience, as there are other parts of the center with different scientific themes. They have also chosen to represent a Costa Rican rainforest with plants and animals typical of Costa Rica. The botanical garden rainforest presents different plants from diverse tropical rainforests and regions. The rainforest at the science center presents a selection of tropical animals from various groups, for example amphibians, primates, birds, whereas the rainforest at the botanical garden has fish (Koi Carp) in a centrally placed pond and also potentially some poison arrow frogs and ants (according to signs). The two settings differ not only in visual terms, but also when it comes to sound levels, with the botanical setting being much quieter and calmer than the science-center setting. The view visitors receive in the science center rainforest is a more expansive habitat-based view than at the botanical garden tropical rainforest setting, which can be considered, in visual and sensoric terms, to be an intimate close-up view of individual plants brought together to offer a snapshot rainforest experience.
The science center had, at the time of the study, many colorful and relatively large signs with pictures of the birds and animals to be found in the setting and general information about the rainforest. Little information about the plants was to be found at the site. The botanical garden, on the other hand, had the typical plant labels stuck in the ground or hanging around branches, partly obscured by foliage. Further, these labels warrant a floristic key to be able to interpret (unless you are a plant collector) and this key is posted on a window inside the greenhouse. In addition, the science center has information signs about not touching or feeding animals whereas there are no such signs concerning plants, in the botanical garden.
Data were collected over a period of four days, with two days in each setting. The participants in the study were elementary student teachers visiting the sites as part of a teacher training course in natural sciences, specifically on biology didactics. The student teachers visiting the science center were not the same students that visited the botanical garden. In total 94 student teachers participated in the data collection, out of which 53 student teachers were at the science center and 41 at the botanical garden.

Data analyzed for this paper were collected through individual
questionnaires. Using open-ended questions, these questionnaires aimed to explore the student teachers' experiences and aesthetic consciousness upon visiting the two sites. The questions were as follows: 1. How did you like being in the rainforest? 2. What did you see?
3. Any specific animal? 4. Any specific plant? 5. If you were to phone a friend and tell her/him about your visit to the rainforest today, how would you briefly describe your visit?
Which three words would you use?
The students were divided into groups of four or five and given instructions to walk through the rainforest. At each site observations were carried out as a one-stop visit of each rainforest experience. Hence, the students in the botanical garden rainforest were encouraged to only walk through the rainforest and not take any detours into the other sections and at the science center they were encouraged to walk the whole route, from the canopy at the top to the aquarium at the bottom. They were informed that the research focus was not on individual performances, but on what might draw participants' attention in the spaces being studied. After walking through a rainforest experience the students were asked to complete individual questionnaires. Along with the questionnaires, the students were also observed and their conversations were recorded. These data are not included in this paper.

| Ethical considerations
The research followed the ethical considerations described by the Swedish Research Council (Swedish Research Council, 2017).
F I G U R E 1 (a) The enclosed rainforest setting at the science center and; (b) the botanic garden greenhouse used in the study. Photographs: Anna Maria Hipkiss

(a) (b)
The student teachers gave their written consent to participate and were informed about the aims of the study, the use of the data, and their rights to confidentiality and to withdraw from participation.

| ANALYS E S
The questionnaires were analyzed qualitatively in order to explore the observations the students made and the words the students used to describe their experiences in the two settings. The answers provide information on what is noticed and also evaluations and attitudes toward experiences at the sites. The words and phrases used provide indications of how the setting is "read" by students and reflects their response to the rainforest.
The questionnaires were coded by two researchers, one of whom specialized in biology educational research, and one specialized in linguistic educational research. Expressions were coded at every occurrence in each questionnaire, even if they were mentioned as answers to different questions. If the same expression appeared more than once in the same answer and related to the same phenomenon, it was, however, categorized only once.
The main categories of plants, animals, and aesthetics were defined in advance, but subcategories emerged as a result of "open coding" (Cohen, Manion, and Morrison, 2011). The categorization of mentions into the three main categories was considered to be unproblematic as they are distinctly different. However, the coding of mentions into the subcategories was subjected to repeated readings of the answers given and negotiated between the coders and the theoretically grounded aspects of mentions relating to plants and animals (e.g., Knight, 2008;Balding & Williams, 2016) and from studies regarding humans and plants (e.g., Sanders, 2007;Balding & Williams, 2016). This process is similar to the one presented in Andersson and Wallin (2000); "[the] categories emerge by a process of hypothesizing them and checking them against actual answers".
This resulted in a number of subcategories such as smell, color, scale, adaptive features (Sanders, 2004) and other new ones established by the researchers in the analytical process (e.g., sensoric, experiential, holistic, and specific). The aesthetic mentions in the questionnaires relate to the broad sense of the word as used by Wickman (2006), that is, aesthetics not only refers to that which is beautiful or nice, but also includes ugly and unpleasant or negative impressions and experiences. Aesthetic mentions were categorized in two main subcategories: sensoric and experiential experiences. the impressions of the environment as such, for example an appreciation of the rainforest as a whole or the experience of walking through a rainforest. Specific experiences refer to when students in their questionnaires describe their impressions in more detail, as for example the rainforest as a tropical experience. An overview of the coding scheme is shown in Figure 2, with examples of mentions in each category.
In the analyses, the two settings have been separated and are presented in parallel. As our main aim with the study was not to compare the two sites, but to qualitatively explore the affordances these kinds of sensory-rich and multimodal settings possess, we do not offer any statistical comparisons of the two sites-and the analysis was therefore not made on an individual level. However, we present the two sites in parallel in order for the reader to see indications of differences and similarities in what the students notice at either site. As the number of students who participated at the science center was larger than at the botanical garden, we have presented the number of mentions as percentages of the total number of mentions per site.

| RE SULTS
The results are divided into three sections; the first giving an overall picture based on the three main categories; the second dealing with what the students observe, which relates to questions 2-4 in the questionnaire; the third deals with how they describe their experiences, which relates to questions 1 and 5 in the questionnaire.

| Overall picture
The total number of data points, that is, mentions coded into the three main categories aesthetic experiences, plants, and animals respectively, added up to 1,474 mentions for the two sites together. Of these, the majority (54%, 802 mentions) were categorized as aesthetic experiences, and nearly one-third (30%, 439 mentions) were coded as animals and 16% (233 mentions) as plants ( Figure 3 and Table 1).

| What do the students observe?
With regard to mentions of plants they are, as might be expected,

| Specific and nonspecific plant and animal mentions
There Here we see the student's response stating that they saw different animals, also making specific animal references and selecting the sloth for a special mention. In many responses in the science center a selection of animals were "seen" and little or no attention was directed toward plants.

| What do the students experience?
Our analysis reveals that the students' answers are rich in aesthetic expressions, both regarding the animals and plants mentioned and regarding the environment as such (in total 802 of total 1,474 mentions coded) as shown in Table 1 As detailed in the coding scheme (see Figure 2), aesthetic expressions were coded as either experiential or sensoric, the results are presented in Figure 6.

| Experiential mentions
Experiential expressions amount to 76% of mentions and sensoric to 24% of mentions, for the combined sites. Each site demonstrates similar division of expressions ( Figure 6).
The main category of experiential expressions was divided into two subcategories; holistic and specific. These two categories were intended to illuminate how and what was experienced in the rainforests. Holistic mentions included positive exclamations relating to the pleasure of being in a rainforest, the cacophony of sounds of being in a rainforest, or a general negative experience based on concerns for animals in the rainforest. The specific experiential mentions concerned, for example the diversity of the rainforest or of it seeming realistic.
Some answers from the botanical garden illustrate the difference between the environment the students are used to, and the rainforest: Q1. How did you like being in the rainforest? It was interesting to see so many new plants. Lovely climate.
Q5. If you were to call a friend/pal and tell her/him about your visit to the rainforest today, how would you briefly describe your visit?
Which three words would you use? Inspiring, cool, interesting.
In the science center rainforest similar responses were made. There were also responses that related positively to being near the animals in the science center: Q1. How did you like being in the rainforest? It was fun and interesting to see animals and nature that you don't find in Sweden.
Q5. If you were to call a friend/pal and tell her/him about your visit to the rainforest today, how would you briefly describe your visit? Which three words would you use? Nice, unusual, interesting. To conclude, the experiential expressions in the questionnaire suggest that most students at both sites were positive about the visit. There were however 16 references (of 613 experiential references) that were coded as negative experiences and these covered aspects of the setting at the science center having too little information and being questioned from an animal rights perspective. Many students' experiential references, such as "realistic", "nature-like", suggest a positive aspect of meeting a different environment and seeing animals and plants in an environment that seems, and feels, to them natural and realistic.

| D ISCUSS I ON
In this study we explored student teachers' observations in two sensory-rich indoor settings-both tropical rainforests-one in a science center, where animals are in the foreground and one in a greenhouse in a botanical garden, where plants are in the foreground. As is concluded by Mangione (2016), sensoric affordances offered in museums vary and thereby have an impact on visitor experience.
Our In combining data from both sites, we find that mentions of animals in the questionnaires are more frequent than mentions of plants. Our analyses reveal a dominance of animal references at the science center and a dominance of plant references in the botanical garden, which is in accordance with that which is foregrounded in the two settings. Previous studies suggest, however, that reasons for liking visits to a botanic garden are not always about the plants themselves, but rather a positive place-based experience, that is, the affordances of the environment in which the plants play a crucial role are important (Sanders, 2007). In addition, Sanders (2007), found that positive experiences from zoo visits were described by the children with zoo animals at the center of their attention. information, such as the use of plants, was available at the botanical garden but not at the science center.
Regardless, the difference in number between noticed plants and noticed animals indicates that plants in these types of indoor environments need to be presented in a way that enables them to better compete for attention as is described by Darley (1990): "As animals, we identify much more immediately with other animals than with plants. Plants do not move around, they do not eat or drink and they do not respond (in an obvious way) to anything in their environment." Since most of the plant observations were made in the botanical garden setting, we suggest that in order to notice plants-the basis for most life on earth-in an animal rich environment, plants need to be foregrounded in the design of such settings and information about them clearly displayed for visitors. This should help give plants the prominence they deserve and ensure they are not overlooked as simply forming the backdrop to an animal-rich setting.

ACK N OWLED G EM ENTS
We are grateful for the students who gave their consent to participate and our department that gave us extra support to develop this research, which was made within the project "Beyond plant blindness-seeing the importance of plants for a sustainable world", Thanks also to the doctoral students at our department who helped with the data collection: Margaretha Häggström, Malin Brännström and Kassahun Weldemariam and to Irma Brkovic for valuable advice regarding presentation of results. We also appreciate the comments made by the anonymous reviewers of this paper as well as the thorough editorial work, which increased the quality of the paper.