The education for sustainable development and the outreach of Geosciences are action guidelines of the Arouca European and Global Geopark. The geodiversity of the Arouca Geopark covers metasedimentary and magmatic Paleozoic rocks (550 – 245 M.y) and also recent sedimentary rocks (< 2 M.y) (Sá et al., 2009). The outcrops of the NE of the territory have an important fossil record demonstrative of several biodiversification events occurred during this Era. In this context and in the scope of the celebrations of the International Year of Biodiversity (2010) was created a didactic exhibition titled “Biodiversity in the Paleozoic”. It included artistic representations of the most emblematic species of the Paleozoic Era, produced by Carlos Dias, a Portuguese artist that assumes himself as “a curious by the questions of life on the Earth“.

The exhibition was inaugurated on 22^nd May  2010, the International Day of Biodiversity, during the opening of the “European Geoparks Week 2010” at Arouca Municipal Museum, and was completed during the last quarter of 2010, with artistic reproductions of an Anomalocaris, a Trilobite, an Eurypterid, an Opabinia, a Dunkleosteus, an Ichtyostega, a Dimetrodon, an Orthoceras and a Meganeura. Each animal represented is representative of a Period of the Paleozoic Era. This exhibition finished in 14^th 2011, having also been displayed at the Oporto Literary Club during the second half of August 2010.

During the exhibition in the Arouca Municipal Museum, 4875 visitants attended it. There were developed several educational activities which included workshops, thematic sessions and guided visits, especially directed to pupils and teachers from the Kindergartens to Secondary schools of the Arouca Geopark territory. These activities involved 1228 participants of whom 937 were pupils and 105 teachers.

With this exhibition and related activities was intended to highlight the celebrations of International Year of Biodiversity and of the European Geoparks Week, while contributing for the scientific literacy through the outreach of the Earth History with emblematic species that lived during the Paleozoic Era. In this sense, the main educational strategy was to sensitize visitors for understanding that changes undergone by the paleobiodiversity, allow us to better understand the need of protection of the present biodiversity, following the principle that “the Past is the key of the Future”. The great success achieved by this exhibition was demonstrated during the 2011 Carnival parade of the Arouca Geopark, where the educational community was disguised with the life beings of the exhibition.

1. AGA – Associação Geoparque Arouca, Rua Alfredo Vaz Pinto, 4540-118 Arouca, Portugal, drocha@geoparquearouca.com; apaz@geoparquearouca.com; aduarte@geoparquearouca.com
2. Departamento de Geologia, ECVA, Universidade de Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro, Quinta de Prados, Apartado 1013, 5001-801 Vila Real, Portugal, asa@utad.pt

References

Sá, A. A., Brilha, J., Rocha, D., Couto, H., Rábano, I.,  Medina, J., Gutiérrez-Marco, J. C., Cachão, M. & Valério, M. (2009). Geopark Arouca. Geologia e Património Geológico. AGA – Associação Geoparque Arouca, 136pp.