Habitats, Features and Life Cycles F-2

Connect 

Use the activities in the Teaching Guide (below) to spark students’ curiosity before their Healesville Sanctuary visit.

Connect and Understand 

Students will be immersed among wildlife and habitats as you explore Healesville Sanctuary.

With a Sanctuary teacher, students will be supported to explore using their senses and learn valuable observational skills to identify the features, life cycles and needs of Australian animals. By participating in guided discussions and listening to insights and stories, they will discover what makes Australian animals so unique and how we can help to care for them and the environment.

Your Sanctuary visit will include: A Welcome (for arrivals between 9:50am – 10.10am), a Sanctuary Teacher workshop (40 minutes), Spirits of the Sky presentation and keeper talks. Check out your Teaching Guide for other ideas of what to do at Healesville Sanctuary.

Understand  

Use activities in the Teaching Guide to deepen students’ learning back at school.

Act

Use the Teaching Guide to enable students to master their knowledge and skills in real-world contexts.

Living things have a variety of external features and live in different places where their basic needs, including food, water and shelter, are met (VCSSU042) 

• Students will encounter Australian animals, learn to recognise their common features and uses of these; identify natural habitats and how changes to these affect an animal’s survival 

Living things grow, change and have offspring similar to themselves (VCSSU043) 

• Students will explore the different characteristics in the life stages of Australian animals, including how they are affected by their environment 

Respond to and pose questions, and make predictions about familiar objects and events (VCSIS050) 

• Students are encouraged to bring and consider questions about Australian animals, particularly endangered wildlife 

Participate in guided investigations, including making observations using the senses, to explore and answer questions (VCSIS051) 

• Students are encouraged to use their senses to gather first-hand information about the natural Australian environment and the animals that live there 

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Country/Place on which the school is located and why Country/Place is important to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, and the ways in which they maintain special connections to particular Country/Place (VCGGK066) 

• Students learn how the local Wurundjeri people are connected to the land and animals of their Country/Place