Teaching Sequence

Work through this resource material in the following sequence:

10 minutes

Tune In: The importance of Eucalyptus

20 minutes

Find Out: The importance of biodiversity

25 minutes

Take Action: Koala and biodiversity conservation

5 minutes

Reflection

Tune In: The importance of Eucalyptus

Step 1

In the last lesson, we started exploring some of the issues koalas are experiencing as their habitat changes. We explored how scientists collect data on koalas to count their populations and assess their conservation status. Now we know the koalas are in trouble, it’s time to use more science to find out how we can help them. Let’s dive into it!

Watch the following video with your students to introduce them to the koalas' most important resource - the Eucalyptus tree

The beautiful bond between koala and eucalyptus tree | Nature's Great Divide - ABC TV & iview (youtube.com/watch?v=QC2V311zieo)

Step 2

Using the image of the Eucalyptus tree on their Student Worksheet, ask your students to annotate the tree with all of the features of the Eucalyptus that are important to the survival of koalas. For example, when referring to the importance of leaves as food for the koala, students would draw an arrow to the leaves and annotate this position.

You may like students to do this as they are watching the video or together as a whole class at the conclusion of the clip.

Suggested responses:

Branches provide a home for koalas, providing shelter and safety
Trunk/branches allow koalas to regulate their body temperature and cool down by hugging the cool trunks
Leaves are a food source for the koala, even though the leaves are low in protein and full of toxins, koalas' digestive system extracts all the nutrients and is able to deal with the toxins. Koalas also get all the moisture they need from the leaves

Step 3

Remind your students that a habitat provides the animals that live there with food, shelter and water.

Discuss with your students the importance of the relationship between koalas and the Eucalyptus tree.

What is unique about the koala's habitat?
- Food, shelter and water are provided by a single thing - the Eucalyptus tree
What would happen to the koala population if we lost the Eucalyptus?

Now show students this webpage from the Australian Koala Foundation, which shows the loss of forest in Australia since 1788.

What do students notice about the change in Eucalyptus forest coverage over time?
How would this be affecting the population of koalas in Australia?

Find Out: The importance of biodiversity

Step 1

Explain to students that having healthy Eucalyptus forests is important to ensuring koala populations are also able to thrive. Just like animals, plants live in a habitat, and their growth and survival are impacted by the changing conditions.

Ask your students, What do trees need to survive? What makes a healthy habitat for trees? Students may suggest:

water
air
soil
nutrients

Step 2

Let’s meet Australia’s ‘ecosystem engineers’ who are hard at work improving the water, soil and nutrients for our eucalyptus trees (among other things!).

Bandicoot Tracking - Behind the News - (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOfOvxizfrA)

Numeracy Extension: A bandicoot digs an average of 41 digs an hour, from dusk till dawn, around 12 hours, every day. Each dig moves around 2.7 grams of soil. How much is that a night? How much in a year? How does this compare to other digging mammals like echidnas or wombats? Conduct online research and see if you can discover which animal is the hardest-working engineer.

While our koalas need trees to survive, the trees need bandicoots to survive. In the video, we saw that bandicoots need insects, grubs, fruit, and bulbs to survive, more animals and more plants. So it turns out, that koalas don’t just need Eucalyptus trees to survive, they need ‘biodiversity’.

Ask your students to brainstorm what they think the word biodiversity means. You might like them to break the word down into its parts, ‘bio’ and ‘diversity’, to assist them in working out what it could mean.

Suggested answer: ‘bio’ means life, and ‘diversity’ means variability. Biodiversity is essentially the different variety of living things in an environment or habitat.

Step 2

Watch this video with your students, which shows the importance of biodiversity in our world.

What is Biodiversity? - WWF International (youtube.com/watch?v=b6Ua_zWDH6U)

When you have finished watching the clip, discuss with students using the following questions as prompts

What is biodiversity?
Why is it important?

Step 3

Explain to students that Australia's native Eucalypt forests are important for the conservation of its rich biodiversity. These environments support many different species of flora and fauna that live in and depend on the forest. This includes species native to Australia and threatened species (source).

Take Action: Koala and biodiversity conservation

Step 1

Explain to students that protecting koalas starts with protecting and restoring their habitat, and protecting biodiversity. Last lesson, we learnt about the different ways scientific knowledge is used in conservation, to identify problems, consider the options, and then make decisions. The next step is then ‘science communication’, or sharing this information with the world. Today, we’re going to plan a piece of science communication!

Watch the following video with your students from WWF:

Koalas Forever - WWF-Australia - (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1L6hyGiooY)

Ask your students to recount the three actions that will help to protect biodiversity

Supporting wildlife and koala hospitals;
Protecting and restoring habitat
Planting trees

This is an example of science communication. The video shares facts and provides a strong, clear message about what needs to be done. Today, we are going to take these three actions and create our own piece of science communication to help support koala recovery.

Step 2

Allocate students to groups of 3-4. Their task is to communicate to an audience a message surrounding one of the three actions in the WWF video and how this will specifically help koala populations. Encourage students to research using the internet and resources provided to answer the questions for their action. The aim of the student's message is to educate their audience on how this action affects the forests (either positively or negatively) and how koala health and populations are also impacted.

Action	Resources	Questions
Wildlife hospitals	Wildlife Hospital on Wheels	What could cause a koala to need emergency care? How do wildlife hospitals help wildlife? How does this affect biodiversity?
Protect and restore habitat	Koala corridors 🌳 Cores, Corridors and Koalas - A Pathway to Reconnection \| WWF-Australia We All Need Trees: Bangalow landholder creates a koala habitat haven \| WWF-Australia Endangered Koalas - Behind the News Koalas Forever \| WWF Australia	How can we protect forests? Why do we need to protect forests that is already there? How do we restore forests? What is the impact of protecting forests on koala populations? How does this affect biodiversity?
Plant trees	Planting trees for koalas in the Northern Rivers \| WWF-Australia	How are we planting trees? Why do we need to plant more trees? How does this affect biodiversity?

Step 3

In their groups, have students complete their worksheets, using online research to help build their answers. Students will investigate the issue, identify the audience they need to talk to and craft the message they want to send.

Step 4

Have the students who worked on the same actions share their messages with each other. Working together, can you take those ideas and create one really strong message?

Literacy Extension: Have students provide feedback to other groups on their planned messages, and then let the students follow through with creating their media.

Reflection

Ask your students the following questions:

Why is it important to use scientific knowledge when identifying problems, considering the actions and then making decisions about what to do?
Why is scientific communication important?
Why is raising awareness on environmental issues important?

Spread the Word: Koalas Need Biodiversity

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