This 3 hour lesson aims to teach students about how the environment has changed over time in Western Australia. Students will consider how the natural area near their school may have differed 100 years ago. They will discuss how Aboriginal people and European settlers viewed the land differently due to their cultural backgrounds and needs. The class will then be divided into 7 groups, each assigned to research a time period of environmental history in WA. The groups will create dramatizations to teach the class about the key points of their time period. On the third day, each group will present their dramatization while the class discusses and asks questions.

1. Module Topic: The Story of Your Place (History of the Environment WA)
L2 - Changing places
Target Audience Estimated Duration
Year 9 & 10 3 hours
Lesson Aim
Students consider how the environment would have been different in the past. They also look at
what shapes our perceptions of place; how these might change over time and why our perception
might be different to other people in the past and now.
Lesson Summary
Students consider how the environment they imagined at the start of the 1st lesson would have
been different in the past. They then begin to consider the factors that affect how they see things.
They think about how and why aboriginals and new settlers might view the land differently.
In groups students read about a different episode in the Environmental History of WA, using the
student PowerPoints, and develop a dramatisation to illustrate this to the rest of the class.
Preparation
Teacher
Divide students into 7 groups.
Projector and computer to show teacher’s Powerpoint.
Save 7 student power points where they can access them.
Students
Each group should have access to at least one computer.
Lesson Plan
Ask students to think back to the natural area they thought about at the start of the previous
lesson. Ask, ‘How might this area have been different 100 years ago?’ Students record in their
books at least 5 possible differences. It might be easiest to think in terms of what they would have
seen, heard, felt and smelt more of or less of.
Printed on recycled paper Hotrock Lesson Plan 2010 www.thehotrock.org.au

2. Introduce the idea of a changing baseline. What we think of as a pristine natural environment
may in fact be quite different to one that was around in the past. For example the number of
native animals and birds is likely to be much lower now due to predation by invasive species e.g.
foxes as well as the destruction of surrounding habitat.
Ask pupils to think about what it is that changes the landscape. The answer is humans. Discuss
with them how different attitudes to the landscape and the environment will cause them to change
it in different ways. They could think about the different attitudes between aboriginals and settlers
200 years ago. Students should divide their page into 2, aboriginals on one side, settlers on the
other and write down some of the ways that they think these people would view the land and the
things that would shape these views.
E.g.
Aboriginal Settler
• Familiar.
• Have lived in landscape for generations.
• History of hunting.
• Know uses of native plants and animals
 move to take advantage of the
seasons and different things available in
different places at different times.
• Strange, different to what they know 
don’t value native species, want to
introduce things from home, to make
themselves feel at home.
• Need to make money and live.
• Looking for where can grow crops and
build homes want to clear land for
these.
Discuss their answers and encourage students to think about how their own history/culture will
affect how they see the landscape (have they always lived in the city? Do any of their hobbies/
interests involved outside spaces). Encourage empathy for others and an understanding of why
different people might hold different views.
Printed on recycled paper Hotrock Lesson Plan 2010 www.thehotrock.org.au

3. Divide the class into 7 groups. Explain that each group will get a PPT with information about a
different episode in the environmental history of WA. These are the titles of the different PPTs.
1. The First Australians.
2. European Arrival and Invasion.
3. White society in the 19
th
Century.
4. Chopping down trees in the 20
th
Century.
5. Where have all the animals gone?
6. The story of Perth.
7. Good news at last.
The group should study their PPT and decide what the most important and most interesting points
are. They should record both of these. Then introduce their task which is to produce a
dramatisation to illustrate the main points and themes from their Powerpoint.
They should think about the people involved and why they might do things. E.g. In the Story of
Perth they could enact early life on a suburban block, explaining why they need to be so big and
then a family looking to build a house on a new edge of town development, why do they want to do
it, could something make them think about the environmental impact, maybe a meeting with an
older person who remembers it how it was before. Each dramatisation should be about 5 minutes
long. Give the groups the remainder of the hour, and the next lesson to plan their dramatisations.
Go round helping the groups and keeping them on task.
In the 3
rd
hour (lesson) the groups should present their dramatisations. These should be done in
the order on the teachers Powerpoint. After each dramatisation discuss what they were trying to
say as a class, what new things they learnt etc. Other groups should be encouraged to put
questions to the groups.
You might like to use the worksheet for L3 – Future places as a recording sheet for students
during the presentations, or the factors on it as ones to think about during presentations.
Printed on recycled paper Hotrock Lesson Plan 2010 www.thehotrock.org.au