Backyard Bush Blitz - Looking Closer at Species

Australian Curriculum content descriptions: 

Year 5 English:

• use appropriate interaction skills including paraphrasing and questioning to clarify meaning, make connections to own experience, and present and justify an opinion or idea AC9E5LY02
• Plan, create, rehearse and deliver spoken and multimodal presentations that include relevant, elaborated ideas, sequencing ideas and using complex sentences, specialist and technical vocabulary, pitch, tone, pace, volume, and visual and digital features (AC9E5LY07)

Year 5 Science:

• Examine how particular structural features and behaviours of living things enable their survival in specific habitats (AC9S5U01)
• Write and create texts to communicate ideas and findings for specific purposes and audiences, including selection of language features, using digital tools as appropriate (AC9S5I06)

Year 6 English:

• identify responses to characters and events in literary texts, drawn from historical, social or cultural contexts, by First Nations Australian, and wide-ranging Australian and world authors (AC9E6LE01)

Year 6 Science:

• Investigate the physical conditions of a habitat and analyse how the growth and survival of living things is affected by changing physical conditions (AC9S6U01)
• Write and create texts to communicate ideas and findings for specific purposes and audiences, including selection of language features, using digital tools as appropriate (AC9S6I06)

Syllabus outcomes: EN3-8D, EN3-1A, ST3-10LW, ST3-4WS, ST3-11LW.

General capabilities:  Critical and creative thinking, Literacy

Cross-curriculum priority: Sustainability

Relevant parts of Year 5 English achievement standards: Students contribute actively to class and group discussions, taking into account other perspectives. 

Relevant parts of Year 5 Science achievement standards: Students analyse how the form of living things enables them to function in their environments, and communicate their ideas and findings using multimodal texts

Relevant parts of Year 6 English achievement standards: Students contribute actively to class and group discussions, using a variety of strategies for effect

Relevant parts of Year 6 Science achievement standards: Students describe and predict the effect of environmental changes on individual living things. Students communicate ideas, methods and findings.

This lesson is part of the wider unit of work Backyard Bush Blitz – Years 5 & 6

• A3 images of Bush Blitz species (access here or here)
• Clothes pegs
• Headband Game
• Image cards of Bush Blitz species (access here – printed out so that each student has one card)
• Bush Blitz Slides

This lesson is designed to build students’ competencies in the following skills:

• Communication
• Critical thinking
• Creativity
• Collaboration
• Cultural understanding

Time required: 120 mins

Level of teacher scaffolding: Medium – facilitate class discussion and demonstrate/ model game and questioning

This is an original Cool+ lesson.