Australia Here We Come!

This morning we welcomed Lucinda’s mother Denise to flower class so we could learn all about Australia. Australia is the first country on our around the world international month trip. Lucinda had brought along an interactive game which showed all the counties in the world. When you pressed a button it told you all about that country and even asked the user some questions about the countries too. Nile, Eito, Riko and Lucinda all used the game on the carpet area. On the main table we started off with a big wooden map puzzle of Australia and New Zealand. It was very interesting to hear all about the different areas of Australia. On the second table we continued with our earth and continents pictures using the compass to draw a perfect circle. Once we had drawn the countries onto the globe we then used colored pencils on them to make the ocean and land stand out. Soon it was time to start our Australia theme at the main table with our friends. Denise and Lucinda told us and showed us lots of things related to Australia: Australia has a lot of land but a population of only 22 million people. Most of Australia is desert, which Denise explained means it is very dry, hot and sandy. Not many plants can grow in the desert. The majority of people in Australia like close to the coast. Different areas of Australia have different environments, for example in the north there is a huge rainforest area. There are lots of beaches in Australia and if you visited one new beach every day, you would be 27 years older before you finished. There are no active volcanoes in Australia and very few earthquakes. It has the lowest mountains in the world and is very flat. We then looked at the Australian flag together and noticed the 3 main parts. The first part was the United Kingdom flag in the top left hand corner. Secondly there was a big white 7 pointed star which signifies the separate territories and states that make up Australia. The last part is a group of stars called the Southern Cross which shows a star constellation. It is the brightest star system visible from Australia and appears upside down in the northern hemisphere. We then learnt how Captain Cook came to Australia in 1770 and then in 1788 ships sailed from England to Australia with lots of ‘bad guys’ on them. The national flag is red, blue and white but many Australians can be seen wearing green and gold which comes from the national flower, the Wattle which is green and gold. We looked at some wonderful pictures and learnt all about Kangaroos, Emu’s, Wombats, Koala’s, kookaburra’s and platypus. We learnt a new word ‘Marsupial’ which means the animals have tummy pouches to hold their babies too. We then started to make a beautiful koala mask. First we cut out a black nose from paper and stuck it onto some great card. We then got some white stuffing and attached it to the ears. The teachers helped us put the elastic on the sides and we took a group photo wearing our koala masks. Thank you Denise, it was a great morning and we learnt so much. After snack time and park we read a book together called ‘Wombat Stew’ which is a great story about a dingo that gets tricked. We then got our passports and went to the airport in the classroom. Nile and Olivia worked at the airport at immigration and checked our passports. We needed to add our photos to the passport and climbed aboard the airplane. When we arrived our passports were checked and a small Australian flag put in our passports too. While eating lunch we listened to Rolf Harris sing a special famous kangaroo song which was fun.