Contour Education Resources

Hi there everyone. Just a short post to let you know about our online resources as they’ve recently been reorganised.

We have PD workbooklets, activities, videos and links that you can use with your students and most of the activities use freely available software such as Google Maps, Google Earth or QGIS.

We also have a special resource that is very top-secret and will be appearing online soon…….can’t say much more but you lot are in for a treat as it is tied to the Australian Curriculum. A draft version of this activity can be downloaded by clicking the image above (of resources, get it?) and we would really appreciate your feedback, in fact your feedback will drive any changes made over the next few weeks.

The activity has students of upper primary or lower secondary, visually assess the health of a waterway at a number of sites. They then use Google Maps to create a map showing the relative health of the sites along their waterway according to the nine criteria for data collection. Students finally select a map symbol that best represents the health of each site before making some recommendations for improvements. Hopefully, a neat and easy-to-use activity to introduce spatial technologies to students. Year 7 looks most appropriate at this stage given the Environmental Resources unit in the Australian Curriculum, recently released……….read on for more juicy details.

Avid readers of this blog or site would understand how committed we are here to getting spatial technologies into schools in meaningful ways. This activity represents a collaboration between Contour Education and a significant player in the world of resource management, and it has been tied to the Australian Science Curriculum and to the Geography Shape Paper; it will be revised to map the current draft verison of the Australian Geography Curriculum once we get your feedback. We know you are busy teachers and time is an issue but your comments below, even after a preview viewing, would be great. This version is yet to be updated with the Australian Curriculum (keep your eyes out for an upcoming post dedicated to the newly released Geography curriculum) but will be mapped in the same way the Science curriculum has been mapped in the document.

Thanks and don’t forget to check our upcoming PD events in Brisbane and NSW!