I
n our Year 10 Unit “The Geography of Wellbeing”, we are using Botswana as a case study to investigate responses to the HIV/AIDS epidemic.
Since many of my students initially had no idea of where Botswana is (could you point it out on a map right now?) and because none of them had been to Africa, I decided to take them on a virtual visit: Continue reading “A visit to Botswana”
I created a virtual visit to Florence.
The aim of this activity is to give kids an indication of what this amazing city is like. I purposely did not include very difficult questions or complex activities; this is really about having a wander around and discover some of the places that are so important in the history of the Renaissance.
The outcome of this virtual excursion is “Seven Florence Facts”; students just have to share seven interesting renaissance facts they learnt as a result of this online excursion.
Activities include walking around Florence Cathedral (Il Duomo), going inside the Uffizi Gallery, sliding a photo on History pin to see what the Ponte Vecchio looked like after WW2 and a look inside a Medici villa.
Continue reading “A Virtual Excursion to Florence”
A great way to explain plate tectonics and simple plate movements is by using Oreos. This is based on a lecture by Dr Bob Lillie of the Department of Geosciences at Oregon State University. I found the PPT online at the Oregon State University website but frankly, the internet is quite full of “Geo-reo activities”
Here is the PPT: 
Oreos Plate Tectonics. I have changed the PPT a little (mainly to get rid of Comic Sans, I get a bit twitchy whenever I see that font).
The kids responded really well to this activity. There is nothing better than some hands-on activities to make information stick. The students were like little Pavlovian dogs; salivating while moving the “plates” around on the “magma”. After 15 minutes of playing with Oreos they gobbled it up in 1 second flat. Added lesson: delayed gratification!
Below are the History and Geography skills from three different frameworks / sources: The Australian National Curriculum, our own Humanities Department and the IB DP Group 3, History and Geography. It’s very useful to have them all together as they confirm and compliment each other.
[toc levels=2 title=”Table of contents”]
Skills needed in the Australian National Curriculum History, by the end of Year 10:
Content related
Critical analysis
Our school’s Humanities department recently received this email from the Royal Geographical Society Queensland regarding the fate of Geography in the new Australian National Curriculum. Continue reading “A call to arms for Geographers”