RIC-0667 Aboriginal Cult 5-6

Using the Environment
Changes in the
Environment
(page 75)
Special Trees
(page 76)
Important Things
(page 77)
Colour the
Environment
(page 78)
Aboriginals and the Environment
Teachers Notes
• Write the word ‘environment’ on a large sheet of paper. Ask the students to
give a definition. List their suggestions on the paper. Discuss.
• Display pictures of a natural environment to students. Ask ‘How do you
know this is a natural environment?’ Accept and discuss all answers.
• Display pictures of a built/created environment and compare the two.
• Read information to students, focusing on the importance of the natural
environment to traditional Aboriginal people.
• Complete the worksheet and glue them in order on a separate sheet of paper
or in a scrapbook.
• Read the information on page 72 to the students. Discuss it, focusing on
how the Aboriginal people used trees.
• Ask ‘What do we use trees for?’ Accept all answers and explain to students
that paper comes from trees. You may wish to draw a diagram on the board
explaining the process from a tree to paper.
• If you have access to a paper recycling kit, you could demonstrate how paper
can be recycled.
• Ask selected students what Aboriginal people used trees for and write all
answers on the board.
• Allow students to complete the worksheet.
• Inform students of the importance of natural products in the environment
to traditional Aboriginal people and why they were important. (Use the
information sheet provided.)
• Talk about how we use resources from the environment today; for example,
trees give us paper and rain provides us with our drinking water.
• Using students’ input, make a list on a large sheet of paper or the board of:
(a) what environmental resources traditional Aboriginal people used
(b) how they were used
(c) what they were used for.
• Discuss and complete the worksheet.
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• As a class, discuss the importance of the environment for traditional Aboriginal
people.
• Tell the students about some of the changes that were made to the environment
when non-Aboriginal people arrived in Australia (clearing the land for farming,
fencing off land etc.).
• Ask ‘How do you think the changes to the environment may have affected
the Aboriginal people?’ Encourage students to focus on food availability. (The
trees that were cut down by non-Aboriginal people may have had animals
and birds in them that the Aboriginal people ate.)
• Complete the worksheet. (Students cut and glue the environmental scene in
order—what could happen to a tree before, during and after a storm.)
74 Australian Aboriginal Culture R.I.C. Publications www.ricgroup.com.au
ISBN 978-1-86311-807-1