Unit Plan Rantings

Hey all, I'm stressing out about this. Below are some ideas, let me know what you think. Also, when we work out what the unit will be about/lessons, we need to workout how we will present it.

I haven't broken things down into individual lessons, I've just stuck ideas under the relevant sections from Murdoch and Hornsby's planner (up on LMS in Integrated studies).

I don't mind the idea of before was bush etc. I just think it should be part of a greater sustainability unit. If we just focus on before/after, what will our 'Action' be? Usually the 'Action' activity allows the students to participate in some sort of community action and allows the unit to end on a positive note. It also helps them act on what they have learnt and links it to every day life. I was thinking that this could be students informing their peers about what they can do to be more environmentally friendly at home/have less of an impact on the environment. Maybe even assess how sustainable the school and taking steps to make it better.

Sayra's lessons could still be used, but they would be used in conjunction with other activities. Here's an example:

I'm going to assume that the before/after dioramas fit into the 'Making Conclusions' section of the Murdoch and Hornsby planner. Also, I'm going to assume the peer information sessions slot into the 'Action' section of the proforma.

'Tuning In', one activity could be using place-mats.

Kath Murdoch uses place-mats: put a photo of an environment in the middle of an A3 piece of paper. Split the page into quadrants with questions in each quadrant (What do you see in this picture? How did it get this way? Where in the world was this photo taken? What lives here?)

Photos could be of:

lush rainforest
logged forest
nice beach
oil spill near a beach
pretty country town
congested city

Students fill in each quadrant. Other Tuning In could be playing some games such as: Catchment Detox, Recycle Zone, US EPA and stuff from arkiveeducation.org (to name a few); these can be used throughout the unit as we see fit, but work well as Tuning In.

Students can be taken to a museum (as per Sayra's suggestion) to look at all the animals we used to have. This can be part of Tuning In; why aren't these animals around any more? What happened to these animals? Also, students could look at endangered animals (hello Zoo visit). Students can pick an animal and spend some time finding out what happened to it or why it is endangered. Sites like Red List, the ABC site (and maybe Seed Hunter if we look at native plants that are endangered) could be relevant here.

'Finding Out'
Activities can be related to the texts we have discussed (Uno's Garden, Animals of Farthing Wood, Jeanie Baker books etc.). These could be used to scaffold lessons about how environments have changed. Here we talk about natural habitats (Sayra's before was bush) and then what humans introduced to the environment and what they removed. Tasks like comparing pages from different sections of Uno's Garden or looking at the changes that occur throughout the pages of the Jeanie Baker books.

I think this leads nicely to the Story of a River activity which has clear links to Science, Humanities (Geography), English and maybe Maths - resource sheets and instructions are on the website. With this activity, students can get an understanding of how humans and what they build can impact a river. The teacher can say: 'A power station has been built near the river', the students add the appropriate ingredient (in this case vinegar) and see what happens to the water.

We can use Robyn's mind maps as part of 'Sorting Out'; students can look at the texts from 'Tuning In' and list key words, concepts etc. Some students may choose to take photos of their 'river' or even the animals from the museum/zoo and they can visually sort out their information. KWL charts and Venn diagrams could also be used.

During 'Going Further' students can research a sustainability topic...need to find a way for them to display the information that they find.

Looking at the proforma, we would need to flesh out the Understandings, Related Values/Attitudes/Issues, Key Concepts sections. I think that's about it. Have I made any sense?

Since we don't have to have individual lesson plans, we just have to demonstrate that the unit consists of about 10 'activities/lessons', 3 of which are Maths related and 3 that are Lit. Maybe a vague presentation outline could be each person does one of the following:

1. Introduce the unit, reasons for choosing it (here we can discuss info from Understandings and Key concepts)
2. What aspects of VELS (progression points, Domains etc.) are covered.
3. Discuss our Maths focus lessons/activities and their integrated links
4. Discuss out Lit focus lessons/activities and their integrated links
5. Discuss some of the other Integrated activities