Teaching sequence

Work through this resource material in the following sequence:

10 minutes

Tune In: The importance of soil health

20 minutes

Find Out: Soil health and water management

25 minutes

Take Action: Soil health and regenerative farming practices

5 minutes

Reflection

Tune In: The importance of soil health

Step 1

Begin by posing the following question to students:

is soil just dirt?

Invite students to share their thoughts with the class.

Through your discussion, lead students to the questions:

is there such as thing as soil health?
is soil health important?

Step 2

Students are to watch the following video:

Regen Farming - Charles Massey and Living Soils Password: RF_EDU (https://vimeo.com/841107917)

(Note: This video comes from the documentary Rachel’s Farm, which explores the journey that a farmer - Rachel Ward - takes when shifting her farm from conventional practices to regenerative practices.)

Once complete, invite students to respond to the following prompt:

I used to think…
Now I think…

You can then ask students to share their responses through class or pair discussion. Suggest the following questions to guide your discussion:

what thoughts or questions do you have about the complexity of soil?
what thoughts or questions do you have about how your food is grown?
what thoughts or questions do you have about how many jobs are focused on soil and soil health?
has the video made you change your mind about anything? Why/ why not?

Step 3

Students will now explore the impact of intensive farming practices on our soil.

Students should read through the Intensive Farming fact sheet and, using the space provided, annotate the factsheet in response to the following questions (also available on the factsheet):

why do you think farmers might farm practice intensive farming?
what negative effects of intensive farming on soil health did you notice?
why do you think farmers need to be supported to be able to move away from these intensive farming practices?

Students can then collaborate with a classmate to share, discuss and amend their responses.

Find Out: Soil health and water management

Step 1

Write the following question on the board:

Why is it important to minimise soil disturbance and keep the soil covered?

Share the following video and invite students to use the information in the video to help them answer this question.

Once complete, engage students in a class discussion on why students think that this is such an important focus for farmers.

Step 2

To think about the relationship between water and soil health, students will conduct two demonstrations that show how soil type can affect filtration. Depending on the time available to you, you could complete one or both of these demonstrations:

Teacher-led demonstration - the importance of soil for drainage
Student-led experiment - soil drainage and the importance of water - Note: This experiment is to be kept in a suitable environment in the classroom where the students can grow and observe their seeds. This can be referred to and observed as the unit progresses. If the seeds survive, students can take them home at the end of the unit and plant them directly into the soil in their egg carton pots.

Take Action: Soil health and regenerative farming practices

Step 1

Explain to students that improving soil health on farms can be a bit of an experiment. This is because soils and ecosystems differ and because different farms have different histories of treatment and use. Guided by soil science, regenerative farmers need to experiment with different treatments to find the one that works best for their conditions.

In this video, we see some of the experiments for improving soil health that were conducted on one farm:

Regen Farming - Experiments with Soil Password: RF_EDU (https://vimeo.com/841107556)

(Note: This video comes from the documentary Rachel’s Farm, which explores the journey that a farmer - Rachel Ward - takes when shifting her farm from conventional practices to regenerative practices.)

Once complete, invite students to suggest some of the ‘experiments’ they saw in this video. Explain that when improving soils, it might be that you need more than one treatment, so trying a range of different options is a great place to start.

Step 2

In pairs, students are to examine one of the following Australian case studies below where soil health and water filtration improvements have occurred (also available on the Student Worksheet - studies 1 and 2 would be best for students requiring support). Ensure they are evenly divided amongst the class - this is important for Step 2.

Case study 1
Case study 2
Case study 3
Case study 4
Case study 5
Case study 6

(Global studies can be found here.)

Students must explore their case studies and take key notes on the following areas (also available on the Student Worksheet). They will be sharing their knowledge with their classmates, so they must ensure they are familiar with the study:

What do they farm/produce?
What led them to make changes in the way they farmed?
What changes were made on the farm and why?
What was the role of water in these changes?
What outcomes have been observed due to these changes to soil health on their farm?

Tip: The Soil and Climate Change fact sheet can be used to provide a background to the importance of soil health in tackling climate change.

Step 3

Using a round-robin arrangement, students are to be paired with another student who has focused on a different case study to their own.

Students are to act as an expert on their case study and impart their knowledge to the other student while taking notes on the case study they have not studied. Each student will have 2 minutes to share their expert knowledge with their partner and/ or take notes.

Students will walk around the room with different partners until they have notes on all 6 case studies.

Extend: Students could write a short response regarding the links between regenerative farming practices and the importance of soil health which will be submitted to their teacher at the start of the next lesson. This could be used to fulfil the Literacy requirement for this lesson.

Reflection

Note: if you plan on completing multiple lessons from this unit, students should use a separate document for reflections throughout these lessons to track their changing views on agricultural practices in Australia.

Invite students to work independently to select 2 of the following questions to respond to (also available on the Student Worksheet - you could adjust the number of questions students respond to based on time and student ability):

Why is soil health so important to human survival?
What is the importance of water quality for soil health and crop production?
What problems have occurred due to a lack of understanding of soil health?
Do you think it is just farmers who are responsible for soil health? Explain your answer.
Do you think that regenerative agriculture is the answer to improving soil health? Why or why not?

Take it further

Students who complete the work early can engage with the separate ongoing lesson on Space Agriculture, which has been written and designed specifically for this purpose.

Differentiated learning

We trust that teachers are the best equipped to know how to cater to the diversity in their classes. At Cool, we incorporate a variety of differentiation strategies into each lesson. Firstly, each lesson in this unit appeals to an array of different learning preferences. Learning activities can be completed in a number of different ways - if a student feels more comfortable speaking rather than writing, there are opportunities to accommodate this.

In lessons that feature group work or learning stations, we trust that teachers will use their discretion in knowing how to best organise their students in accordance with positive working relationships and ability. Graphic organisers and scaffolds are often included so students can ‘visually think’ and keep a record of their work. While our lessons are designed to be 55 - 60 minutes in length, we trust that teachers will manipulate lesson and segment times according to the needs of their students.

Dig Deep Into the Importance of Soil

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UN Sustainable Development Goals

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