MAKING SENSE OF PLANET EARTH AND BEYOND: LEVEL 3
ACHIEVEMENT OBJECTIVES
Students can
- investigate the major features, including the water cycle, that characterise Earth's water reserves, e.g., oceans, rivers, lakes, glaciers, ice-caps, snowfields, clouds;
- gather and present information about the origins and history of major natural features of the local landscape, e.g., volcanic cones, coastal cliffs, river flats, erosion scars, lakes, local soils;
- locate and use information obtained from space exploration to clarify, challenge, and extend their ideas about the general nature and behaviour of the Earth, its moon, and the other planets in our solar system, e.g., Moon missions, satellites, space stations;
- justify their personal involvement in a school- or class-initiated local environmental project, e.g., a school tree-planting project; paper, glass, metal, or plastic recycling.
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SAMPLE LEARNING CONTEXTS
- Space
- Natural disasters
- Communications
- Weather
- Global warming
- Soils
- Whakatere
- Weather maps
- Parks
- Civil Defence
- Reservoirs
- Volcanoes
- Pakiwaitara o Ngatoro-i-rangi
- Beaches
- Satellites
- Voyages of discovery
- Rockets
- Atlases
- Antarctica
- Nga momo wai
- Te Atea Glaciers
- Avalanches
- Water pollution
- Geysers
- Lakes
- Moon probes
- Space exploration
- Solar power
- Science fiction
- Space travel
- Ngawha
POSSIBLE LEARNING EXPERIENCES
Students could be learning by:
- constructing a concept map linking stages of the water cycle;
- using dyes to investigate the effects of changing temperature on convection currents in water;
- brainstorming, in groups, the recreational uses of water as preparation for the creation of a wall mural;
- investigating Māori tapu as pertaining to wai, awa, and puna;
- constructing a photograph collage of local landforms, such as rivers, lakes, beaches, and mountains, as a means of familiarising themselves with features in their local environment;
- listening to Māori legends to learn more about local landforms;
- offering explanations for some features of the local landscape, e.g., a range of hills, plateau, crater, river, market garden area, or swamp;
- visiting the natural history section of the local museum, or talking to older people, to gather information on a natural local feature or local landform;
- making a model volcano to illustrate its structure;
- discussing ideas about what Earth looks like from the Moon or a space shuttle;
- viewing a video of a space mission to the Moon to increase awareness of the Moon's landscape and/or viewing a video of a space launch to increase awareness of the use of technology in space exploration;
- researching some facts about another planet to help answer students' questions about a planet;
- 'adopting' a local beach, roadside, or park to experience personal involvement in caring for the environment;
- developing a video to show at a parents' evening that describes the class's involvement in a recycling project.
ASSESSMENT EXAMPLES
Teachers and students could assess the students':
- understanding of the processes involved in the water cycle, when the students role play, in groups, the experiences of a raindrop;
- ability to apply knowledge about the effects weather can have on human activity, when the students role play in groups appropriate responses of a family to a flood warning that is predicted to affect the homes in their neighbourhood;
- understanding that freezing can damage materials, when the students draw before and after diagrams of a plastic bottle full of water which is placed in a freezer;
- ability to locate and record relevant information, when the students present a simple report on the origins of a local natural feature;
- knowledge about the surface structure of the Moon, when they write questions to use in a role play interview of an astronaut returning from a Moon mission;
- observation skills, when the students compare surface features as shown in a photograph of Earth taken from space with features indicated in a world map;
- awareness of the advantages of wise use of physical resources, when the students write a report outlining the value of recycling a selected material;
- ability to justify their personal involvement in an environmental project when the students write a report for a local newspaper about the school's Arbor Day tree planting.
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