Lesson+3


 * Lesson 3: Local Community - Excursion **
 * Topic: ** Community
 * Key Question: **What can we discover about our community?
 * Year Level: **Grades 3 & 4 – VELS level 3
 * Duration: **2 hours

> [|http://vels.vcaa.vic.edu.au/essential/discipline/humanities/level3.html] · Chart papers & markers · Digital cameras · Permission Letters · Recording Sheets · Clipboards for each student
 * Learning Purpose: **
 * Increase students’ awareness of the make-up of their immediate community
 * Understand the effects of co-operation within a community
 * Express their feelings about the community
 * Learning to read a simple map
 * Being able to generalise questions and solve them by observation and discussion
 * VELS References: **
 * Students develop awareness and understanding of the effects of people's interactions with their environment and the ways in which these affect their lives.
 * Students begin to visualise and describe location and direction using simple alphanumeric grids and compass points.
 * They learn to use atlas maps and a globe to locate and name the states and territories of Australia.
 * Materials Required for the Lesson: **
 * · ** Pencils/crayons for each student

· Send home the Permission Letters prior to the excursion and asking for parent confirmation. Invite four parent volunteers. · Arrange a briefing session for the parent volunteers. Explain what features you require the students to focus on. · Provide a set of questions for each parent along with a list of names of the children in their group.
 * Set Up and Preparation: **

Begin the lesson by asking the students what they know about their local community. Brainstorm the important features of the local community with the teacher recording class ideas on the whiteboard.
 * Engagement: **

1. Tell the students that they are going on an excursion in the local community today. They are going to be divided into four groups and explain that each group is going to explore different aspects of the local community.
 * Procedure: **

The four groups are: __The conservationist__ studies animal life, trees and parks. They will identify these, and be able to describe specific features such as the equipment in a park, birds and animals seen, common trees in blossom. __The detective__ observes people, and notes what they are doing. There may be an opportunity to interview some. __The engineer__ studies road, bridges, signs and street names. __The inspector__ studies the main buildings and the service they provide.

2. Divide students into four groups. Show a simple map of the local community to the students and have each group to identify the key symbols which are relevant to the aspect of the community they will be studying. Explain to them that they are to mark on the map the places where the features that they are looking for occur. They are also going to use the Recording Sheet to document their findings about what they see, hear and smell.

3. Assign one volunteer parent per group. Excursion starts. Ideally, each group has at least one digital camera for recording their findings by photos.

Students come back from the walking tour. Review the excursion with the students. Students share their new findings. Ask students how they feel about their own community.
 * Pulling it together: **


 * Possible Extension Activity:**
 * Create a “Map Key” of all the things they saw and heard. Students can use photos taken during the tour or pictures they draw by themselves to represent different items on the map. Different groups of children are responsible for contributing different items to the “Map Key”.
 * Students can develop a dice game which records the excursion by pasting the photos taken during the tour and drawing the route on a big piece of cardboard.

During the tour, the teacher would ask prompting questions of the students. After the tour, teacher would collect students’ Recording Sheets and talk to adult helpers about students’ performances.
 * Observation of Students’ Learning: **

Students are divided into smaller groups so that shy students are inclined to speak out their ideas while more confident students have higher chances of practicing being leaders in different groups. This lesson involves an excursion and recording findings in many different ways hence it appeals to visual, naturalistic and intrapersonal learners.
 * Catering for Inclusion: **

> [|http://vels.vcaa.vic.edu.au/]
 * Teacher’s Resources: **
 * Rennie M. // My Community: Teacher’s Manual //(1983). Sydney: McGraw-Hill Book Company
 * The People and Places Around Us [|http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/unitplan.jsp?id=67]