The Big Idea

‘I play an active role in the democratic process that shapes my community’

The Driving Questions:

What is a democracy?
How has my identity been shaped over time?
How can I contribute to my community?

In Term 1, our Big Idea is centred around democracy, the role of local government and how we can be active participants within our community. Each week in our ERP sessions, students take ownership of their learning and discover more about areas they are interested in. This term, we have focused on looking at different methods we can use to research and find information. These have included reading books and summarising, writing letters to people in our community, and using reliable sources on the internet.

Research Task: People Who Have Shaped Communities

Learning Intention: To use a reliable source of information to find out about a given topic.

Task:

When designing this task, we looked into what people with influence in our community do. We narrowed down a list of influential people. Some of these included:

Ash Barty
Jim Steins
Glenn McGrath
Cathy Freeman
Turia Pitt
Nelson Mandela
Martin Luthor King
Eddie Mabo
Fred Hollows
Ned Brockman

To begin our research, we watched ‘The Life of Fred Hollows’ and had a class discussion about the change he made in his community and how it still impacts communities to this day.

Students took on the role of a researcher and used the internet to find out about someone who has shaped their community from the list above. They identified what influence their chosen person has had, and five interesting facts about them. Students completed a fact file to summarise the information into their own words.

Examples of Students Work:

What can you do now?

Continue the conversation at home by asking your child about how a person can be influential within their community. Are the influences positive and beyond their titles of “famous person”?

What kind of changes would you like to see in your local communities you are part of? Who can make these changes, or who can you go to to influence these changes?

Things to remember

Library

Please return any outstanding books to the library next week before the holidays. Students will be able to borrow new books for the holidays.

Homework

Homework will not be handed out in the last week of term. It will continue next term.

Gardening/Kitchen

This Friday, 3/4R will be cooking. If you are able to volunteer for either the gardening sessions (on Thursdays) or the cooking sessions every three weeks, please let your classroom teacher know or sign up on the volunteer page.

Dates to remember:

Tuesday 4th of April - School Photos

3/4 Team

School Photos Next Tuesday