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Geography K–10 · Years 1–2

A term of weather and nature records beside a published Aboriginal seasonal calendar

Geography (HASS F–6 sub-strand) with Science understanding, Earth and space sciences (ACARA Year 1); NSW Geography K–10 (2015) Stage 1 focus area: Features of Places (Weather and seasons: how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples describe seasons or seasonal calendars)

PracticalLow risk

The idea

Seasons can be read from plants, animals and weather in a place rather than from dates, and the Aboriginal calendar for a Country divides the year differently from the four-season calendar.

Safety card

Low riskAn adult supervises

Hazards

  • sun exposure on the weekly walk
  • bees at flowering plants
  • wildlife in the grounds
  • misuse of cultural knowledge

Controls

  • hats and a 10 minute walk
  • observe flowers without touching
  • no handling of animals
  • calendar used only as published, with its permission statement and copyright notice, and no additions presented as Aboriginal knowledge without the community's agreement

Note

No chemicals or heat are used. The activity is run under the school risk-assessment procedure; RiskAssess (riskassess.com.au) holds templates for school practicals and fieldwork. The NSW Department of Education Chemical Safety in Schools package is not triggered.

What you need

  • The seasonal calendar for the Country the school stands on, where one is published with the knowledge holders' permission; for schools on D'harawal Country, the D'harawal calendar on the Bureau of Meteorology Indigenous weather knowledge pages, used with the permission statement and copyright notice shown there
  • Class thermometer in shade and the school rain gauge (see the Stage 1 rain gauge entry)
  • A tablet for weekly photographs of the same three plants and one open patch of sky
  • Weekly record sheet: date, morning temperature (°C), rain since last week (mm), wind, plants flowering, animals seen or heard
  • A class wheel chart: 12 months around a circle with two rings, one for the four seasons and one for the published calendar

How to do it

  1. Before the unit, the teacher asks the local Aboriginal Education Consultative Group or the school's Aboriginal education staff which Country the school is on and whether a published calendar for that Country is appropriate to use in class.
  2. Read the calendar with the class from its published page: count its seasons and list the signs it gives for the months of this term (plants, animals, weather).
  3. Each week on the same day, record the morning temperature and the rain since last week, and photograph the same three plants and the sky.
  4. Walk the school grounds for 10 minutes each week and list any plant flowering and any animal seen or heard.
  5. At the end of each month, place the class record on the wheel chart and compare it with the calendar text for that month and with the four-season ring.
  6. At the end of the term, list which calendar signs the class saw at school, which it did not, and where the calendar's season change fell in the term.

What you should see

A term of weekly entries (temperature in °C, rain in mm, plants and animals) set beside two calendars on one wheel. The class sees that the published calendar's seasons do not begin and end on 1 March, 1 June, 1 September and 1 December: the D'harawal calendar on the Bureau of Meteorology page has six seasons, and the class reads the months each one covers straight off that page and marks them on the wheel. Whether a named plant or animal sign is seen at the school depends on what grows and lives in the grounds; the weekly record is the evidence either way. It worked if every week has an entry and each month was compared with the calendar text for that month.

What changes

This activity lists no variables to change, measure and keep the same.

Common misconceptions

Each of these ideas is wrong, and the activity is a chance to test it.

  • Every place in Australia has the same four seasons.
  • A season starts on the first day of a month everywhere.
  • Aboriginal seasonal knowledge is only about the past.

Curriculum references

The NSW syllabus outcomes and Australian Curriculum v9 codes this activity supports. They are references, not a verified or complete curriculum alignment.

  • Geography K–10 Syllabus (2015), NESA; current and taught in 2026, replaced from 2027. The outcome codes are not printed on the NESA landing page for this syllabus, which only links the document, so the url given is the syllabus document itself (geography-k-10-syllabus-2015.docx); the code and its outcome text were read in that document on 23 September 2026.GE1-1GE1-3
  • Human Society and its Environment K–6 Syllabus (2024), NESA; implementation from 2027, not yet taught; code read on this page on 22 September 2026HS1-GEO-01
  • Australian Curriculum v9AC9HS2K04AC9HS1S02AC9S1U02

Sources

The pages the author read to write this activity.

  1. www.bom.gov.au/resources/indigenous-weather-knowledge/indigenous-seasonal-calendars/dharawal-calendar
  2. www.bom.gov.au/resources/indigenous-weather-knowledge/indigenous-seasonal-calendars
  3. primaryconnections.org.au/v84-sequences/weather-my-world
  4. www.nsw.gov.au/education-and-training/nesa/curriculum/hsie/geography-k-10-2015
  5. curriculum.nsw.edu.au/learning-areas/hsie/hsie-k-6-2024/outcomes

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