Geography K–10 · Years 5–6
Read the bushfire prone land map around the school
Geography (HASS F–6 sub-strand); NSW Geography K–10 (2015) Stage 3 focus area: Factors that Shape Places
The idea
Bush fire prone land is mapped by local councils and certified by the Commissioner of the NSW Rural Fire Service, so the hazard around a place can be read from an official map and measured with its scale.
What you need
- NSW Rural Fire Service bush fire prone land checker (online) or the council's certified map
- Printed screen capture of the map at a known scale (the on-screen scale bar printed with it)
- Ruler, string, coloured pencils
- Digital Earth Australia Maps or the school aerial image for vegetation comparison
How to do it
- Enter the school address in the RFS checker and record whether the school and the nearest houses are on bush fire prone land.
- Print the map with its scale bar. Colour each category shown in the map legend with the legend's colours.
- With string and the scale bar, measure the straight-line distance from the school gate to the nearest mapped vegetation edge in metres.
- Compare the mapped vegetation with the aerial image: does the mapped bushland match what the image shows?
- Write two sentences on what the map says about the school's risk and one action the school takes (the school's own bushfire plan).
What you should see
A coloured map with a measured distance in metres and a written reading of the map. The distance is a real number from the scale bar; whether the school is on mapped bush fire prone land is a fact read from the map, not judged from the view out the window. It worked if a second pair measuring the same distance agrees within the width of one scale-bar tick.
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.
- Only houses inside the bush are at risk from bushfire.
- A map is a picture, not a measurement.
Safety card
Hazards
No hazard is listed.
Controls
No control is listed.
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.
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.GE3-2GE3-3
- Human Society and its Environment K–6 Syllabus (2024), NESA; implementation from 2027, not yet taught; code read on this page on 22 September 2026. The syllabus outcomes page used in this file for HSE-GEO-01, HS1-GEO-01 and HS2-GEO-01 renders Early Stage 1, Stage 1 and Stage 2 outcomes only and carries no Stage 3 block (checked 23 September 2026), which is why the Stage 3 code is cited from its focus-area content page instead.HS3-GEO-01
- Australian Curriculum v9AC9HS5K05AC9HS5S02AC9HS5S06
Sources
The pages the author read to write this activity.
- www.rfs.nsw.gov.au/plan-and-prepare/building-in-a-bush-fire-area/planning-for-bush-fire-protection/bush-fire-prone-land
- www.rfs.nsw.gov.au/plan-and-prepare/building-on-bush-fire-prone-land/bush-fire-prone-land/check-bfpl
- education.nsw.gov.au/teaching-and-learning/curriculum/hsie/hsie-curriculum-resources-k-12/hsie-k-6-curriculum-resources/hsie-s3-units
- curriculum.nsw.edu.au/learning-areas/hsie/hsie-k-6-2024/content/stage-3/fa3130b657