Teacher preparation:

Overarching learning goals: By participating in this activity students will understand that there are different ways of valuing marine biodiversity.They will make connections between how we value marine biodiversity and the actions we take to conserve it. Finally, student are given the opportunity to develop literacy skills around planning, drafting and performing short plays.

Teacher content information: We’re always being told that we need to look after biodiversity, that we need to preserve it: but why exactly? Is it because of the animals and the plants that live there? If it was just about looking after the plants and animals, couldn’t we just build huge zoos, gardens and aquariums and keep everything safe that way? Or is there more to it than just looking after the plants and animals? In this activity your students will explore a range of reasons why we might want to preserve our biodiversity, in particular, our marine biodiversity.

Cool Australia Presents Biodiversity

Student and classroom organisation:

Step 1.

Begin this activity by covering some of the basic terms that will be used throughout this activity. Ask the class to define the following terms: biodiversity, ecosystem, extinction. What exactly do these terms mean? Ask pairs or small groups to demonstrate their understanding of these terms by writing one or two sentences that use all three of these words. For example: “In order to preserve biodiversity and prevent species extinction, all members of an ecosystem must be protected."

Ask students to share their sentences.

Step 2.

As a class, discuss the following points with your students:

How does biodiversity relate to ecosystems?
Why does it matter that all the parts of an ecosystem are healthy? Why are all the members of an ecosystem important?
What might happen if one part or member of an ecosystem collapses and no longer exists? For example, what might happen if a certain type of fish dies out of a reef ecosystem, leaving its predators without a food source and its prey without a predator?

Also discuss the potential impacts of the disappearance of an animal for the other animal and plant members of an ecosystem and for people who live near or make use of the ecosystem.

Step 3.

Sort the class into small groups of 3 or 4. They are going to discuss an ethical statement about conservation and biodiversity. They should discuss the following question and come to a group consensus.

We should conserve our biodiversity for the sake of human survival only.

Step 4.

Discuss the groups’ ideas with the class, listing the reasons on the board. Once complete, work with the class to see if the points raised can be grouped into general categories. In academic research around biodiversity, five main categories for the protection of biodiversity are generally proposed. These are as follows:

Economic: “Biodiversity has values that can help people make money or keep people from losing money.”
Recreational: “People love outdoor activities like fishing and mountain bike riding, which would not be possible if wild habitats were destroyed.”
Human health: “Biodiversity could potentially hold the key to many medicines that would help provide cures for mild and serious illnesses now and in the future.”
Human rights: “Indigenous people depend on biodiversity to fulfil their cultural traditions and ways of life.”
Spiritual/intrinsic value: “Biodiversity should be preserved for its own sake”, “Animals and plants have a right to live,” and “People rely on wild places and creatures for spiritual fulfilment and play.”

Did you and your students come up with points that fit with these categories, or did you find new ones as well? Which ones do they believe to be true to them? It may be that they choose more than one category to describe their opinion on biodiversity conservation, and in fact, many people who believe biodiversity should be preserved will use more than one of these categories to make their point. For example, a person may believe that biodiversity has an intrinsic value but may also be believe that outdoor experiences for human recreation are deeply important.

Step 5.

Have students visit the following web sites to read some of the arguments in favour of preserving biodiversity. For each site they visit, ask them to write “economic,” “recreational,” “human health,” “human rights,” and “spiritual/intrinsic” to indicate which category the site subscribes to in favour of preserving biodiversity.

The Wilderness Society - www.wilderness.org.au
National Geographic - www.nationalgeographic.com
WWF - www.worldwildlife.org
Australian Marine Conservation Society - www.marineconservation.org.au
Save Our Marine Life - www.saveourmarinelife.org.au
The Nature Conservancy - www.nature.org
Zoos Victoria - www.zoo.org.au or Taronga Zoo - taronga.org.au

As they do their online research, ask students to look out for other sites not on the list that fall under the different categories, and to record these sites and explain why they believe these sites subscribe to particular categories.

Once students have finished looking at the websites, ask them to write a short statement describing each of the five types of arguments, explaining this line of argument in more detail with specific examples of these pro-biodiversity arguments.

Assessment

Break the class into groups of 5 or 6. Each group is asked to plan, draft and perform a short play describing an encounter between a group of people (or organisms) who each believe that their way of looking at nature is correct (for example, economic, intrinsic or spiritual, human heath or human rights, and recreational).

Ensure your students select appropriate text structure for the writing purpose and sequence content to have an impact on the audience.

Students should also use of a range of modes (visual, verbal and additional, such as music) to give their story depth, to create atmosphere and to enhance the drama their story.

Groups should perform their plays to the rest of the class.

Ask students to use the Peer Assessment Rubric to assess the plays of other groups.

Homework/Extension

Ask students to complete the reflections questions on the student worksheet.

Seal the Loop - Conserving Marine Biodiversity

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