Have students bring in their favourite recipe from home and orally present it to the class starting with the phrase: ‘I like my … cooked like …’. With our book recommendations, we want to spark an interest in children to discover STEM in their everyday lives. Most books go beyond the obvious STEM connections and can be a great starting point for exploring children’s questions and ideas further. Go outside into the school grounds and categorise a variety of objects as eitherman made or natural. Explain to students the assessment requirements and show them an already finished exemplar poster (point out positive aspects including a title/ message, colour, materials…) A father takes his son to a place you can only reach by boat and the boy immerses himself in this secluded ancient and magical place where present, past and future overlap. Collages allow us to spot people and animals from a long time ago in the forest. After wondering how long it took the trees to grow this tall, the boy imagines what will happen when this secret place isn’t so secret anymore and buildings start to replace the ancient forest.

Play a game of telephone and discuss how stories that are passed down can be changed and adapted over time. Hands-on engagement Students create a poster with the message “Save the forests” (words are on the word wall and IWB)Ask the students to retell the story as a sequence of events. Then get them to change one element; "how would Creating texts – Create short texts to explore, record and report ideas and events using familiar words and beginning writing knowledge (ACELY1651) Working in pairs, discuss the role that the images play in increasing our understanding of the author's message.

Jeannie Baker projects a hopeful portrait of urban renewal in Home. As in her previous Window, the picture book unfolds as a wordless series of collages, this time charting the rebirth of a Continue reading »

http://www.australiancurriculumlessons.com.au/2014/07/27/forest-meets-sea-inferential-comprehension-lesson-plan-f12/ A great book is always a fantastic place to start when planning an integrated learning experience for your students, after all, books are familiar andengaging. The themes running throughout this text lend itself to many regularly taught topics. The boy experiences a connection between past and present. What can he hear? What can you hear when you close your eyes? Which are sounds of nature? Which sounds were not there before human development?

Use interaction skills including listening – participating in speaking and listening situations / asking questions (ACELY1784) What really appeals to me about this book are the illustrations which are collages constructed from different materials including modelling clay, papers, natural materials and paints. The illustrator, Jeannie Baker, made two trips to the Daintree forest to research and collect the materials. Each time I read the book, I find new images and shadows hidden in the rich, textured illustrations and I feel the urge to reach out and touch them. Tuning In – Students discuss which rainforest photos they like and why, connecting to prior learning [investigating and sharing ideas]In the evening, we eat at Whet Restaurant in the jungle. The children’s menu has healthy, kid-friendly options and the owner, Michelle, regales us with tales of cassowaries, lightning strikes and wild tropical storms. She points out the enormous webs of the golden orb spiders, a metre in circumference. The kids are captivated by her stories and she promises more next time we visit. By 7am the next morning the kids are up, ready to ‘whet’ their appetites again.

In groups, students are to create three freeze frames (still dramatic representations using students and props) to represent the past, present and future of the Daintree Rainforest. Students will take photos of each frozen scene and put them together in a multimedia format using Microsoft PowerPoint, Pic Collage or another app. They can then orally tell the story of their pictures. Alternatively, students may assemble their pictures in a collage accompanied by written text. My father says there has been a forest here for over a hundred million years," Jeannie Baker's young protagonist tells us, and we follow him on a visit to this tropical rain forest. Opening this expertly designed picture book reveals two parallel wordless tales: one to be read left to right, the other right to left. The stories follow a day in the family life of two boys, who Continue reading » The boy in Where the Forest Meets the Sea imagines all kinds of things through the trunks of the trees and leaves of the forest. Children imagine what they might have seen before writing their own story. Show students some examples of persuasive titles from newspaper articles, travel brochures or protest placard signs. Show them the video ‘ How can we help protect the rainforests?‘ and discuss the persuasive devices used, i.e. short sentences, emotive pictures and music, high modality, etc. Watch a second clip.Students should demonstrate an understanding of each character’s relationship to place and how it has different meaning for different characters over the passage of time. They should also show an awareness of the themes that the author is trying to portray in the book. We leave wowed by this ancient, beautiful meeting place of forest and sea, and hope it remains protected until we return. Using different coloured markers, highlight the similarities and differences between the coast and the rainforest. Then use different colours to highlight the similarities and differences with their school environment. Look at the front cover and ask students if the picture reminds them of anywhere they have been. Point out the boat and ask if anyone has been on a boat before. Ask students to predict the importance of the boat and its occupants, i.e. ‘Do you think the boat will be important to the story? Who do you think the people in the boat are?’ Ask a variety of questions about the book. Open ended questions invite students to make their own personal connections to a text and allow them to move from literal to inferential thinking.Decide whichquestionsto use for,whole class discussion, small group orpaired activities and individual reflections.Here are some examples of the kinds of questions that you might ask your students.