A visit to the natural history museum is part of many pupils' educational program. One way of investigating what children learn about animals is to examine the mental models they reveal through their talk when they come face to face with animal representations. In this study, representations were provided by: (1) robotic models in a museum; (2) preserved animals in a museum; (3) live animals exhibited in a zoo. By recording pupil talk in these settings and then analyzing the content of the talk for comments about the anatomy of animals, their behavior, habitat features and so on, both similarities and significant differences are revealed. Hitherto, little work has been done about such school visits. The collected conversations with live, museum, and robotic animals were analyzed using a systemic network. Robotic animals followed by museum animals elicit more comments than do live animals, and the reality of the images viewed according to the comments of the children are discussed. The implications for zoological education are also discussed. (Contains 17 references.) (Author/CCM)