This paper aims to identify the conceptions of nature existing in Brazilian educational ideas in the 1920s and 1930s. As part of this documentary study, diverse sources in the educational area were analyzed, such as: periodicals, textbooks on reading, geography, physics and natural sciences, published and used in our schools during those decades. Based on the readings and data analysis, the following concepts about nature were identified: anthropocentric, utilitarian, anthropomorphic, such as "common mother and/or all that was not made by man," or "all that exists, all that God created," or "book" and finally, the aesthetic or romantic conception. These conceptions appear explicitly in the textbooks, although they are also present in the other documents analyzed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]