Earth Hour - The places you love

Students explore how nature makes them feel, the Australian places in nature that they love, and how these places might be affected by climate change. Students begin this lesson by participating in a vocabulary exercise about words such as ‘awe’, ‘astound’, ‘marvel’ and ‘inspire’. They then spend time outside in nature, and use a ‘Rake thinking tool’ to investigate how they experience nature and connect to it emotionally.

Using images collected before the activity, students create a collage and supporting presentation to share the places they love in Australia with classmates. Students will then look at how these places might be affected by climate change. Finally, students will create a postcard to encourage their local community to participate in Earth Hour.

Essential questions:

• Why do we need to value our environment?
• How do people and environments influence one another?
• How do people influence the human characteristics of places and the management of spaces within them?
• How do people’s connections to places affect their perception of them?