Reading+-+Week+4,+Create+One+Hundred+Views+of+Your+Local+Area

The K-6 unit, titled One Hundred Views of Bondi Beach was the idea of the author Libby Hathorn.
 * Create One Hundred Views of Your Local Area **

The unit covers the English, HSIE, Science and Technology, Creative Arts and PDHPE key learning areas, and can easily be adapted by schools to any local area using local history, people and resources.

The project involves students using their knowledge and skills to discover and understand more about their local heritage. Ultimately, the completed unit will produce one hundred works of art, poems, stories, photographs and interviews and will involve one hundred performers.

The project involves students using their knowledge and skills to discover and understand more about their local heritage. Ultimately, the completed unit will produce one hundred works of art, poems, stories, photographs and interviews and will involve one hundred performers.

As the students became more engaged in the book and local content, Ms Hardy asked the teaching staff to use outcomes from the KLAs to collaboratively plan teaching, learning and assessment activities that related to a study of the local area based on the students' interests and the local resources available.

'What came out of the working session with the staff was a K-6 integrated unit of work that we named 'One hundred views of Bondi Beach'. However, we soon realised this didn't have to be just about Bondi Beach, it could be a hundred views of any local area, any landmark or site.

'The activities we came up with ranged from poems and paintings of the beach, to discussing and learning about the life cycle of a sea animal, locating oceans around Australia and even issues of salinity for our Year 6 students. It covers a very broad spectrum,'

The highlight of the unit will be a ‘Festical of the Arts’, which will showcase an original play based on the book The Tram to Bondi Beach. The play is co-written by Libby Hathorn and Andrew J Johnstone. The matinee and evening performances will also include songs and dances from 100 performers from the school, representing the sand, ocean and local beach.

Technology in general has been an important component of the project, with students regularly using Waverley Library's Webquest program to find answers to historical questions about the local area.

The One Hundred Views of Bondi Beach project is designed primarily to help students understand and learn about their local area.

'Having a cross-curriculum project that covers Kindergarten to Year 6 is such a fun way for the kids to learn. In one lesson students might be writing poems about the sea and the beach while later that day they might be practising for their performance at the Festival.

'The children have come up with a number of questions about the beach, the ocean and its animals and have been producing literary and factual texts from their investigations. 'Using the children's natural curiosity of the world around them was the impetus for this project. In planning this project the staff integrated skills and strategies from those five key learning areas

Teachers drew from the outcomes across the key learning areas to develop their cross-curricula planning of the project. Problem-solving, investigating, designing and making, and talking and listening were some of the skills and strategies that were applied by students in their study of local Aboriginal history, multicultural changes, the <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">scientific investigation of water, waves and rocks, Poetry writing and visual arts and much more.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">The whole project has been enhanced with the involvement of parents and local community members.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">'Teachers with a similar idea can take a look at our web site and discover what can be done in their local area — but most importantly, trough, it's such a fun way to teach and to learn,' Ms Hardy said. 'I would encourage any school — large or small, anywhere in the state — to adapt our experience and idea s and engage their students in an investigation of their local area.'