Unit 3: Litter, waste and recycling

Content focus:

Students are introduced to the ways in which people interact with their environment with specific reference to littering, waste and recycling. In doing so they learn about the ways people value environments. Students identify sustainable practices and recognise that there are differing views on how sustainability can be achieved. In completing this unit, students develop skills in acquiring, processing and communicating geographical information.

Syllabus content area:
Protection of environments
•     Students investigate of ways waste can be managed sustainably.

Key inquiry questions:

• How do different views about the environment influence approaches to sustainability?
• How can people use places and environments more sustainably?

Geographical concepts:

• Place: the significance of places and what they are like. For example: places students live in and belong to and why they are important.
• Space: the significance of location and spatial distribution, and ways people organise and manage the spaces that we live in. For example: location of a place in relation to other familiar places.
• Environment: the significance of the environment in human life, and the important interrelationships between humans and the environment. For example, how and why places should be looked after.
• Interconnection: no object of geographical study can be viewed in isolation.
  For example: local and global links people have with places and the special connection Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples maintain with Country/Place.
• Scale: the way that geographical phenomena and problems can be examined at different spatial levels. For example: various scales by which places can be defined such as local suburbs, towns and large cities.

Outcomes:
A student:

• examines differing perceptions about the management of places and environments
• examines differing perceptions about the management of places and environments
• acquires and communicates geographical information using geographical tools for inquiry.

Inquiry skills:
Acquiring geographical information

• pose geographical questions
• collect and record geographical information

Processing geographical information

• represent data using diagrams
• draw conclusions based on interpretation of geographical information

Communicating geographically

• present findings in a range of communication forms
• reflect on their learning and suggest responses to their findings

Geographical tools:
Visual representations

• photographs, illustrations, story books, multimedia and web-based tools.

Lessons and worksheets included in the download file:

Lesson 1: Picture Book Study: Somebody Swallowed Stanley
Lesson 2: Litter and Littering :: Teacher Resource Sheet 1 :: Resource Sheet 1 :: Resource Sheet 2 :: PowerPoint 1
Lesson 3: Waste Management Strategies in Out School
Lesson 4: Investigating Waste Breakdown Times :: Teacher Resource Sheet 1 :: PowerPoint 1
Lesson 5: Recycling :: PowerPoint 1 :: Student Worksheet 1