Teaching sequence

10 minutes

Tune In: How and why did English settlers come to Australia?

25 minutes

Find Out: Digging deep into European farming practices in Australia

20 minutes

Take Action: Changing views

5 minutes

Reflection

Tune In: How and why did English settlers come to Australia?

Step 1.

Students tune in to the topic of Australia’s history.

Note: Depending upon your cohort, their knowledge may be extensive, minimal or non-existent.

Watch the following video to 4.50:

Australian History - BTN Special (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zalE0N4kYPg)

Step 2.

Give each student a copy of the Student Worksheet.

Each student will work to complete a Think-Pair-Share routine (available on the Student Worksheet). Students will work independently to answer the questions below and record their ideas in column A of the table on the Student Worksheet. They will then share their ideas with a classmate before adding any new ideas or clarifications they have following their discussion to column B of the same table.

Questions:

What sort of knowledge of farming or agricultural practices do you think the people sent to Australia would have had?
What types of supplies might have been on the three ships that were ‘to set up the colony’?
How do you think conditions on the ship might have affected their experience of the Australian landscape when the prisoners arrived in Australia? (e.g. rats, lice, illnesses, rationed water etc.).

Once complete, invite students to share their ideas with the class.

Find Out: Digging deep into European farming practices in Australia

Step 1.

Students are to break into groups of 3-4 students. Assign each group with one of the following topics and explain that each group is to explore their topic together to generate detailed and accurate information (questions also available on the Student Worksheet):

Settlers brought traditional English farming methods with them to Australia. What were these methods, and what was successful/ unsuccessful about this process?
What plants did European settlers bring to Australia, and how successful were they in a new climate with very different soil?
European settlers brought cloven-hooved, domesticated animals with them. What effect did this have on Australian agriculture and wildlife?
European settlers brought with them rabbits and foxes for sport. What effect have these creatures had on Australian agriculture and wildlife?
Following the Gold Rush, which countries introduced what new farming techniques to Australia, and how successful were these new techniques?
What machinery was used to work the land before the Industrial Revolution in Australia, and what did it affect the land and those who used it?
What changes were brought about to farming machinery following the Industrial Revolution in Australia, and how did they affect farmers and their crops?
In the 1950s, horses began to be replaced by tractors. Was this change possible for all farmers, and what was the effect on your livelihood/productivity if you could/could not source a tractor?

Some starting resources:

History Crunch - The Agricultural Revolution
Industrial Revolution - The Industrial Revolution and Agriculture
Project Britain - Farming in Britain
Agriland - Are ‘old-fashioned’ farming methods the key to the future?
BBC - The Agricultural Revolution
SOE - Native and introduced species in Australia
Agriculture - Invasive species in Australia
Discover - Problems caused by introduced hoofed animals in Australia
Pest Smart - Economic and environmental impacts of rabbits on Australia
NSW Dept. of Planning and Environment - Rabbits
Agriculture Victoria - Foxes
Museums Victoria - Vulpes vulpes (Foxes)
Migration Heritage Centre - Market gardens
ISW - A history of market gardens
Industrial Revolution - Open field farming (pre-Industrial Revolution)
John Hopkins- Industrialisation of Agriculture
Times Agriculture - Industrialisation and its effect on agriculture
Global Food Health and Society - The long-lasting effects of the Industrial Revolution
National Geographic - Industrialisation, labour and life
Living History Farm - Horses finally lose their jobs
Antique Tractor Blog - How horses replaced tractors
Small Farmers Journal - Horse labour instead of tractors.

Step 2

Students can work as a class to create a class timeline (you could use LucidChart), with each group putting their relevant information onto a class timeline.

This can be done by adding relevant information about things like arrival dates (people, animals, plants) or changing farming practices on the timeline and adding relevant information or a key for additional relevant information.

Each student will now have a comprehensive list of European agricultural practices in Australia.

Step 3

Give each group three scraps of paper and ask them to create three questions about their topic area. These questions should be able to be answered using the information collated on the timeline. Students can use the Generating Questions fact sheet to help them write their questions.

Groups should return their questions to the teacher, and the teacher should number them from 1 to 24.

The teacher will then read out each question, and each student should use a workbook to record their answers to each question, using the timeline to help them with their answers.

The groups responsible for each question can confirm and clarify the answers.

Take Action: Changing views

Step 1

Still working in their groups, invite students to complete the following (also available on the Student Worksheet):

Colonisation, European farming practices, and introduced plants and animals altered the Australian landscape at great environmental cost, including large-scale biodiversity loss and soil degradation. The mismanagement of natural resources has led to many longer-term environmental issues. Which of the 8 original topic areas does your group think caused the most harm and why?
For the issue you have selected as being most harmful, now work together to come up with some ideas for addressing that issue in a modern-day context (i.e. you can’t go back in time to change anything, you can only focus on what could be done now). You can undertake some research to help you with your ideas.
Once complete, select one or two representatives from your group to report back to the class about how your group felt about this topic. Each group will have a chance to voice their opinion through their representative. Other groups' opinions may make you think differently about European farming practices and their impact on the Australian landscape!

Step 2.

Finally, explain to students that farmers around the world are turning to alternative methods of farming. One of these is regenerative farming (if you continue with other lessons in this unit, students will have the chance to explore regenerative farming in more detail).

Regenerative farming is based on the idea that the soil holds the key to the success of the farm in terms of animal and crop health, productivity, and long-term environmental sustainability.

In the following video, students are introduced to some farmers who are starting to make the shift from traditional (conventional) farming to regenerative farming. 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:

Regen Farming - Soil Password: RF_EDU (https://vimeo.com/841106919)

Once you have watched the video, you could invite students to share their thoughts about the clip. Consider the statement: “It’s hard work to fight against nature all the time” - what do students think this statement means? How might this statement relate to aspects of traditional farming?

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 answer the following questions (also available on the Student Worksheet):

Have you ever considered how European settlement affected Australia’s landscape and agriculture?
What things did you learn in today’s lesson that will make you look differently at the world around you from now on?

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.

Tuning Into Traditional Farming Methods

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