Simone Hannelly EDLA 204/264 Assessment 2
Wet and Dry Environments. Stage One, Year Two.
Rationale: This unit offers students with opportunities to explore wet and dry environments. Students
will further develop their understanding and knowledge of the structure, text meaning, and language
features. Students will be reading these books to grasp new concepts, ideas and ways of talking about
wet and dry environments, whilst learning new words and concepts (Board of Studies). The ‘conduit’
language theory will be implemented throughout these readings. The teacher will be facilitating
sentence and paragraph structure, meaning and knowledge (Lemke, 1990). A socio semiotic view will
also be used with spoken language interactions between students and the teacher, to further engage and
extend the students understandings and constructed meanings. Using both these language theories
allows the teacher to better focus on these specific tasks and curriculum while working within the
student’s zone of proximal development (Martin, 1993). The students within my class are mostly at the
same or similar reading level; however, I do have two gifted and talented students and one ESL student
to consider. The school has a high socio demographic and is located in a small town 15mins away from
the beach. Most students have experiences with beach environments and some wetland environments,
however none of the students have any kind dry land/environment experiences.
Subject Matter Focus
 Investigate and give simple explanations about natural and built up environments in
their local area, and compare these environments.
 Express feelings and values about places that they and others feel are important.
 Read and listen to texts about caring for the environment, both natural and built.
 Appreciate that people are responsible for environmental change, both negative and
positive. (Board of Studies)
Wetlands by Tricia Oktober
Wetlands is a story based in the tropical North of Australia, where all the native animals come and
gather around a billabong. It describes how dry and dusty the land becomes in the dry months. Then the
clouds begin to form and storms appear and brings with it the much-needed rain. Then all the dry
creeks and billabongs start to rush with water again (Oktober, 2001).
This story builds students knowledge and understanding of north Australia’s habitat, and the different
types of animals that inhabit these wet and dry environments. The setting of this book is not too
familiar to the students, as most of them have not experienced billabongs. The Teacher will require
some pre-teaching so the students can bring further meaning and understanding to the reading. The
teacher will go over terms and meanings of; what a billabong is, the word desolate, what a brolgas is,
the word parched, menacingly, what yabbies’ are, the word agile, forage, erupt, torrential, refuge,
recedes, Siberia, idly, snouts, species, prey, ablaze, lotus, azure, lotus, seizes, comb-crested jacana,
enabling, and ambush. These words should be bought to the student’s attention before the reading takes
place, to ensure the students have an understanding of how the words are grouped, pronounced, and the
particular meaning they bring. There are several words throughout this book however that is easily
decoded by students. This will aid them to make sense of the text, and build on their knowledge of wet
and dry habitats.
This book has a range of sentence structures, from primarily simple, to compound with clauses and
verb groups, e.g. It is daybreak in the tropical north of Australia. In this sentence it does not present
too many challenges for the students to retain meaning from the sentence. However, this sentence may
present some challenges for some students, for e.g. The earth has become so parched that many of the
trees in the open forest surrounding the billabong have shed their leaves as a mean of survival.
This book will be best conducted as a shared reading experience, as the teacher will initially read aloud
to the students as they are following along with the text, actively listening and watching, while reading
themselves, and joining into discussion where possible (Holdaway, 1979). The teacher will introduce
the book to the students by showing the book, the title, and the structure of the book and a brief
summary of what the book will be about. The teacher will then prompt the student’s into discussion
asking what they believe the book might be about, and what they are expecting to discover from this
book. The teacher will deliberately lead the students towards the learning goals such as investigating
wet and dry environments and prompting class discussions, questioning, modeling and explanation,
while extending their knowledge and understanding (Holdaway, 1979). The students will be asked to
find information on certain pages for e.g. what animal lived on page 4. What animal can be found?
Where does it inhabit? What adjective is used to best describe that animal? Shared reading will also
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aid my ESL student as it is easier for them to learn about concepts, and language used as they can see,
hear and read the text. It is also easier for the teacher to observe the students as they interact with the
text, reconfirming that they do actually understanding and can gain meaning from the text. This text
will provide several opportunities for students to; think and act like readers, demonstrate how to make
meaning from text, aid in learning the semantic cues for reading, punctuation, developing vocabulary,
and practice reading with appropriate expression and rate (Pearson, 2002).
To The Top End- Our Trip Across Australia by Roland Harvey
This book is about a young boy and his Uncle Kev going on a holiday, starting from Tasmania and
heading all around Australia until they make it to the very top of Australia. They encounter many
different inhabitants along the way, and make new friends from all around the world. This story tells
how they battled the big waves of Bass Strait, stayed in an underground town, hiked through
rainforest’s and ventured through high plans. This is an excellent text for the students to identify with
the many different types of wet and dry environments Australia has, and how the different
environments can affect the way they live. This text allows them to further explore how a natural
environment can impact upon the food, shelter, native animals, activities they do, the weather and even
the transportation of that area, for e.g. In the Bass Strait it was very rough and very windy… and Penny
spent a lot of her time feeding the fish and dolphins, as juxtaposed to On the road to ‘Upson Downs’
station… Mr. Murphy rolled the ute again on Saturday night… on a very bad stretch of road and had
to walk home’ (Harvey, 2009). The illustration in this book also aids with the meaning of the text,
which is excellent for those really visual learners and the ESL student so they can better grasp meaning
from the text.
This book does not have the usual text layout. The text flows across both pages inline with what the
story is portraying for e.g. When in the Bass Strait the text is set out and displayed in a wave like
formation, which adds to adventure and meaning of the text and further engages students into the story.
Some pre-teaching will need to be carried out before it is read, as the students will be unsure of how to
follow the text, and where to read next. The teacher will also need to bring to the students attention
some possible trouble areas such as no Thylacines, Bogong, some of the sound words
kaaarrrr….aaaarrrrrr, warble warble, ts, bok, gurgle, thwack, sulphur-crested, gorge, shaft,
prospecting, Kata Tjuta, gigabyte, dugong, turquoise, scurried, and Azure as some students may have
no understanding or meaning of these words, how they are pronounced, how to decode them and what
they look like. This will aid in the students decoding so they are able to gain some context and meaning
from the text.
This text uses a lot of short descriptive sentences, however there are still some more complex sentences
within this text. The text uses several proper nouns, adjectives, some alliteration and verbs. Majority of
this text uses words that the students know, have used or have seen before.
This text is best suited for a guided reading activity. In small groups the teacher can affectively preface
the text to the students, clearly outlining what it is they are to expect of the book, and what they are
going to be learning and needing to know. As this text does present some challenges for the students,
and new ideas it is easier for the teacher to guide the students where needed so they are able to read
they text accurately, comprehend the text, therefore have meaning and a greater understanding and
knowledge of wet and dry environments (Holdaway, 1979). The teacher is able to see what strategies
each student is using to decode the text, and create further discussion of the text to see if the students
have in fact comprehended what they have just read, for example the teacher could ask ‘what did they
discover in the underground town? How is it different to the last page when they visited Flinders
Ranges?’ (Wild, 2011). The answers the students give back will provide the evidence for the teacher to
see if they have in fact comprehended the text, created their own meanings and ideas from that text.
Therefore the student will now have a greater knowledge and understanding of that text. This guided
reading provides several opportunities for student to successfully read a new text, investigate the
language features of verbs, nouns, proper nouns, adjectives, and the text layout. It also helps them to
learn how they would use these features and strategies in their own independent reading and writing,
and how to monitor their own reading to clarify that they are getting their point and meaning across for
other readers and know what to do if there meaning is lost (Lemke, 1990).
In conclusion, both of these books provide several learning opportunities for students to further
enhance their knowledge and understanding of not just wet and dry environments but also their literacy
skills, as these books are highly engaging. These texts allows the students to effectively explore,
Simone Hannelly EDLA 204/264 Assessment 2
describe, create and interpret their own meanings, while looking at how these books are modeled and
structured.
Works Cited
Board of Studies. (n.d.). Retrieved 04 22, 2013, from
k6.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au:
k6.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/files/hsie/k6hsie_stg1_unitsofwork.pdf
Harvey, R. (2009). To the top end. Our Trip across Australia. Crows Nest, NSW:
National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry: Harvey, Roland,
1945.
Holdaway, D. (1979). The Foundations of Literacy. Scholastic.
Lemke, J. (1990). Talking Science: Language, Learning and Values. Norwood, NJ,
America: Ablex.
Martin, J. R. (1993). 'Genre and Literacy:Modelling Context in Educational
Linguistics'. (Vol. 13). Annual review of applied linguistics.
Oktober, T. (2001). Wetlands. Sydney, NSW , Australia: Hodder Children's Books
Australia.
Pearson, D. P. (2002). Comprehension Instruction in the primary grades. (Vol. 1
(2)). New York: Comprehension Instruction: Research-based Practices.
Wild, R. (2011). Where do I start? Stimulating ideas for Literacy-rich primary
classrooms. Newtown, NSW, Australia: Primary English Teaching Association
(e:lit).
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[SIMONE HANNELLY ASSESSMENT 2]
Bibliography
Board of Studies. (n.d.). Retrieved 04 22, 2013, from
k6.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au:
k6.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/files/hsie/k6hsie_stg1_unitsofwork.pdf
Harvey, R. (2009). To the top end. Our Trip across Australia. Crows Nest, NSW:
National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry: Harvey, Roland,
1945.
Holdaway, D. (1979). The Foundations of Literacy. Scholastic.
Lemke, J. (1990). Talking Science: Language, Learning and Values. Norwood, NJ,
America: Ablex.
Martin, J. R. (1993). 'Genre and Literacy:Modelling Context in Educational
Linguistics'. (Vol. 13). Annual review of applied linguistics.
Oktober, T. (2001). Wetlands. Sydney, NSW , Australia: Hodder Children's Books
Australia.
Pearson, D. P. (2002). Comprehension Instruction in the primary grades. (Vol. 1
(2)). New York: Comprehension Instruction: Research-based Practices.
Wild, R. (2011). Where do I start? Stimulating ideas for Literacy-rich primary
classrooms. Newtown, NSW, Australia: Primary English Teaching Association
(e:lit).