The present article discusses the problem of forming the basics of environmental consciousness in the children of primary school age. It describes practical experimental work which has been car­ried out with the younger students of city schools. Diagnostics of school children has been carried out by means of the «Naturafil» method developed by V. A. Yavsin. This method is aimed primar­ily at identifying child’s personal attitude to nature. Evaluation of child’s attitude intensiveness is performed by perceptual-affective, cognitive, practical and progressive scales. Also, within the frame­work of the method, naturalistic erudition has been identified in the children, as well as intensiveness parameter of subjective attitude to nature. By means of this methodology, core manifestations of intensiveness levels of attitude to nature in the children of primary school age have been identified. On the basis of the data obtained the author has concluded on the level of development of intensive­ness of attitude to nature in the primary school children of Saratov schools. We can trace key tendencies in the process of forming ecological consciousness fundamentals with the children in a big city. The research shows some contradictions between what a child knows about nature and his type of behavior. Applied aspect of the problem under study may be put to practice in the development of environmental projects helping to optimize the process of formation of basics of environmental awareness in the younger generation.