The environmental performance of the Republic of Serbia is unsatisfactory, and the consequences of environmental degradation reflect on the population's health and quality of life. Taking into account that children and young people are future decision-makers, it is necessary to provide them with an opportunity to acquire knowledge, skills, and develop attitudes that will help them to act in environmentally responsible way, both locally and globally. This paper is part of the ELIPS project which aims to investigate environmental literacy (EL) and the environmental identity among the 7th grade students in Serbia. EL is operationalized comprehensively, encompassing four components: (1) knowledge, (2) affect, (3) cognitive skills, and (4) behavior (Marcinkowski, 1991, 2004; McBeth et al., 2008; Wilke, 1995). The testing of EL among elementary school students was conducted in several countries around the world applying an international instrument for determining the level of environmental literacy, the Middle School Environmental Literacy Survey (MSELS) (McBeth et al., 2008). In the USA, EL was tested on a sample of sixth-graders (age 11-12) and the eighth-graders (age 13-14). The total EL score on a total sample was 144.83 (out of 240) (McBeth et al., 2008). As far as separate EL components are concerned, the students from the USA achieved the following results: knowledge – 40.34; affect – 38.05; cognitive skills – 25.56, and 36.84 for behavior. Students from Thessaloniki (Greece), age12-15, had a total score of 123.31 (Nastoulas et al., 2017). The scores for EL components for the students from Thessaloniki were: knowledge – 35.18; affect – 35.43; cognitive skills – 17.2, and 36.5 for behavior.
In the context of local and global environmental issues, as well as the obligations of Serbia stemming from signing international (UN) documents related to the environment and environmental education, the early 21st century marked the beginning of the implementation of the goals of this concept in the educational system. Regarding elementary education, which is divided into two cycles in Serbia (the first cycle – students of age 7-10; the second cycle – students of age 11-15), these goals were implemented in some compulsory school subjects from the field of science (biology, chemistry, etc.), and in the curricula of some elective subjects. This was the case with the elective subject Guardians of Nature (GN) which was introduced in 2004. It was in the list of electives in the first six grades until 2018, when its status was formally changed and it became an optional activity. Nevertheless, its status essentially remained the same, provided that it is offered by a school which, in turn, is obligated to offer three elective subjects/optional activities in every grade and students are free to choose GN according to their interests. The subject/activity GN, though not compulsory for all students, is significant for our research because its goals/outcomes are focused on developing all EL components and the recommended contents encompass all topics related to the environment and the role of people in its degradation and preservation. In some research, the curricula are linked to the EL level of students. For example, the positive effects of the elective subjects pertaining to environmental education on the EL levels of students in the USA (North Carolina), age 11-14, were identified, especially in the domain of cognitive skills (Stevenson et al., 2013). Taking everything above-mentioned into account, we decided to investigate, apart from the EL of students of age 14, whether there is a connection between attending GN classes and the level of the EL components acquired.

The researchers applied a survey methodology using the MSELS questionnaire (McBeth et al., 2008). The MSELS measures four EL components, with maximal score 60 per each, which means that the total number of the score points was maximum 240. The instrument contains the basic environmental knowledge items (N=17). The tasks related to cognitive skills (N=17) consist of texts presenting environmental problems in real-life situations. Students are expected to identify and analyze the problems given in the texts and then choose the best ecological strategies as solutions to the problem. The items measuring affect (N=25) refer to environmental sensitivity, students’ verbal commitment, and their intentions to preserve the environment. Pro-environmental behavior was measured in the tasks investigating students’ genuine commitment to protecting the environment in everyday situations (N=12). The instrument also includes the questions related to the socio-demographic characteristics of the students (age, gender, parents' level of education), and the electives the students have attended. The applicability of the MSELS (for the population of the 14-year-old students) in Serbian context was confirmed in a pilot study (Marušić Jablanović et al., 2022). The testing of the EL level of Serbian students was conducted on students of age 13-14 (N=877). The sample is stratified according to the regions and the urbanization level of the settlements in Serbia. The collected data were processed by using descriptive statistical procedures (for measuring students’ achievement on MSELS questionnaire, in total, and per EL component). The scores of students who attended the GN course from grades 1-4 were compared to the scores of students who have attended this course from the 5th grade, using an Independent-samples T test. The same test was applied for comparison of students who have not attended the course and those who have attended it since the 1st grade until now.

The results indicate that the total average score of students is 147.93. The average scores for EL components are 37.85 for knowledge, 44.11 for affect, 25.97 for cognitive skills, and 40.01 for behavior. The students from Serbia obtained higher scores than American (McBeth et al.) and Greek students (Nastoulas et al., 2017), both in total EL score and in components affect and behavior. The students who attended GN elective subject/optional activity in both educational cycles have a more pronounced affect relative to students who did not attend the course (Sig = .009; df= 370; t= 2.636). The students who attended the course from grades 1-4 performed better on cognitive skills, compared to those attending it from the 5th grade (t=2.026, Sig=.043). Given that in Serbian educational practice teachers influence children’s subject/activity selection (Cvjetićanin et al., 2011), we may assume that GN contributed to students increased interest in nature, their decisiveness to change behavior and become more pro-active. The results speak in favor of the GN course, in terms of attitudes towards the environment, as well as in favor of the practice of teachers teaching grades 1-4. Nonetheless, the fact that students who attended this course did not have higher scores in other EL components raises concern. The results show that there is potential for improving the levels of EL in all domains, especially the cognitive skills domain. Although the elective subject/optional activity GN positively impacts the development of some EL components among children from Serbia, there are still indicators that the implementation of this course needs to be improved. In addition, some possible ways of developing students’ EL include development of teachers’ environmental competencies, enrichment of compulsory subjects with environmental contents and activities, as well as greater support of school for outdoor learning, cooperation with local community.

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