You Are Here
Topic
This learning sequence is designed to build student understanding
of the Tasmanian Aboriginal story. Students will draw upon their
experience of being in the environment to create a number of
artworks that reflect an awareness of Tasmania’s Indigenous story.
Standard
3
Stages
7, 8, 9
Year Level(s)
5/6
Curriculum area
The Arts
Society and History
Vocational and
Applied Learning
Reflecting social,
cultural and historical
contexts
Identity, relationships
and culture
Systems and
processes
Imagining and creating
new works
Interactions with the
environment
Innovation and
design
Strand(s)
Understanding Goal(s) 1 Students will understand the significance of the land to
Tasmania’s indigenous people.
2
Students will understand Tasmania’s geographical layout
through an indigenous perspective
3
Students will understand how the land is represented through
mapping and other visual forms.
4
Students will understand sustainable land management
techniques
UGs
1
Learning opportunities
Teacher notes and assessment
TARABA
Assessment for learning
Read to students some adapted
Tasmanian Aboriginal stories from
TARABA and ask them to take notes, either
written or visual, and enter them into their
visual art journal.
Have students consider:
What evidence of the animals
described in TARABA might be
found in the bush at Molesworth
(nests, tracks, scats, sightings)?
Assessment of learning
1, 3
The Rabbits
Read The Rabbits to students and discuss
the use of metaphor in this story. Have
students reflect upon this story using a
journaling process.
1, 2, 3
Assess student understanding of
the arrival of European people in
Tasmania through viewing their
journal responses.
What historical event is this story
about?
Gumnuts to Buttons
Assessment of learning
Invite a speaker from the Aboriginal
Sharer’s of Knowledge program or a
member of the Aboriginal Education Unit to
introduce and guide students through
Gumnuts to Buttons, a simulation of the
Tasmanian Aboriginal story.
Assess student understanding of
the Tasmanian Indigenous story
through class discussion.
Discuss similarities between the
story of The Rabbits and the actual
history of Tasmania’s Indigenous
people, described by Gumnuts to
Buttons.
Which is the more powerful
metaphor? Why?
1, 2, 3
Nine Nations
Assessment as learning
Using the Clayworld technique (See Spiral
Garden Resource Book), ask students to
work collaboratively to build a model that
describes the nine Tasmanian Aboriginal
nations that existed prior to European
contact. A relief map of Tasmania may be
useful in assisting student understanding of
Tasmania’s geography.
Assess student understanding of
Tasmanian Indigenous geography
by asking them to include
significant geographical features
and to use symbolism to identify
and discern between nations.
Which Indigenous nation
encompasses the Molesworth
area?
Molesworth Environment Centre
1, 2, 3
Visualisation
Take students out to the trail with their
sketchbooks/notepads.
Ask students to describe the landscape
using a series of key words to describe
their sensory experiences e.g. light, texture,
temperature, smell, colour, contrast sound,
brightness...
Ask students to imagine that they have
been frozen in time and returned to their
land. They have had no prior contact with
European people and have no prior
knowledge of the built environment. They
have no conventional words in their
language to describe things like roads,
buildings, cars, sheep and telegraph poles.
Assessment of learning
Assess student creative writing,
including their ability to:

Use their senses in
describing the landscape

Imagine the viewpoint of
another person

Write using an
understanding of historical
themes and information
Note to the teacher
Read extracts from Two Rivers
and examine the illustrations made
by the student artists. Look at
ways in which an Indigenous view
and a European view have been
represented.
Ask students to respond to the environment
from the perspective of a ‘time-traveller’.
Many images express a
combination of these views. What
Ask students to imagine, and write about,
devices have the artists used to do
the emotional response of a person who
this?
finds their home lands have changed in
such a dramatic way.
1, 2,
3, 4
Land management
Assessment of learning
Invite an Indigenous Sharer of Knowledge
to demonstrate the construction of shelters
and introduce students to the concept of
Indigenous land management including the
sourcing of foods.
Have students discuss and record
information about aboriginal land
management in their journals.
What sustainable land
management practices did
Tasmania’s indigenous people
use?
How do these practices contrast
with European land management
practices?
2, 3, 4
Mapping
Assessment as learning
Explore references to the Molesworth area
e.g. contour maps, Google Earth… Look at
the codes and symbols used by map
makers (cartographers).
Have students consider:
What are the most important
features of this landscape?
What references would Aboriginal
people have used?
Walk students to the top of the hill. Have
students draw a map of the Molesworth
area, noting key landmarks and features.
Symbols
1, 3
Invite an Aboriginal artist from the Sharers
of Knowledge program to introduce
students to Tasmanian Aboriginal art in the
form of petroglyphs.
Explain to students the origin of the word
petroglyph - from the Greek words petros
meaning "stone" and glyphein meaning "to
carve".
How can the key features of this
area be best represented?
What evidence is there of
sustainable land management
practice?
Assessment as learning
Assess students’ ability to create
new designs based on a circular
motif.
What might these rock carvings
symbolise?
What are the common design
elements of these symbols?
Why are these images primarily
circle based?
Discuss with students other circle based
symbols e.g. the sun, moon, yin and yang,
the earth, peace, smiley face, crop circles,
celtic twists, mandalas... Have students
research these and make notes and
drawings in their journals.
Refer students to A Word List of
Tasmanian Aboriginal Languages by N. J.
B. Plomley
Ask students to make a list of all the
concepts that Tasmanian Aboriginal people
had words for – animals, plants, actions,
attitudes, spirits, weather features…
Ask students to devise their own circlebased symbols based on the words that
appear in Plomley’s book.
From these designs, ask students to create
simple three colour stencil designs from
cardboard. Use these to create an image
using red, yellow and black inks. Have
students print these designs using a silk
screen technique or similar.
Have students produce a visual illustration
(map) of the Molesworth environment using
the symbols they have developed.
Assessment of learning
Assess students understanding of :

the significance of the land
to Tasmania’s indigenous
people.

the geography of
Tasmania’s indigenous
people

how the land is represented
through mapping and other
visual forms

sustainable land
management techniques
1, 2,
3, 4
School Based Extension Projects
Make TARABA story characters out of
woven cane. In groups students manipulate
these characters to then tell their stories
(see Woven Spheres – Spiral Garden
Resource Book).
Explore soundscapes with students. Ask
students to collect and replicate a variety of
sounds from the environment e.g. the call
of the Toorittya Bird, people talking,
weather patterns etc. Allow students to
experiment with instrumentation both
conventional and student designed and
created e.g. drums, ocarinas etc.
Create Native Puppet constructions and
Fish Weavings with students (see Spiral
Garden Resource Book). Demonstrate how
to make flax animals.
Paint a mural based upon changes to the
environment over time.
Construct bird boxes to be attached to
trees in the bush.
Resources
Tasmanian Aboriginal Perspectives Across The Curriculum, Department of
Education, Tasmania (1997)
Everett, J. Respecting Cultures: working with the Tasmanian Aboriginal
community and Aboriginal artists, Arts Tasmania (2004)
TARABA: Tasmanian Aboriginal Stories, re-told by Rosemary Ransom,
Department of Education - Tasmania (1997)
Plomley, N. J. B. (1976) A Word List of the Tasmanian Aboriginal Languages,
The State of Tasmania
Ryan, L. (1996) The Aboriginal Tasmanians, Allen & Unwin
From Gumnuts to Buttons, Department of Education - Tasmania (2001)
Two Rivers: a reflective journey, Department of Education – Tasmania (1998)
Marsden, J. & Tan, S. (1998) The Rabbits, Lothian Books
Crossman, Donavan, Mackie,& Petrik (2002) Spiral Garden Resource Book,
Bloorview MacMillan Children’s Centre and Spiral Community Artist’s Circle
Manco, T. (2002) Stencil Graffiti, Thames and Hudson
Manco, t. (2004) Street Logos, Thames and Hudson
Harmon, K. (2004) You Are Here: Personal Geographies and Other Maps of
the Imagination, Princeton Architectural Press, New York
Relief Map of Tasmania, Geo Maps, Italy
Aboriginal Sharers of Knowledge program, Aboriginal Education Unit,
Learning Services North, Department of Education, Tasmania