Teaching sequence

Work through this resource material in the following sequence:

10 minutes

Tune In: What does technology have to do with agriculture?

20 minutes

Find Out: Farmers using technology to care for the environment

25+ minutes

Take Action: Invent a technology for a farm

5 minutes

Reflection

Tune In: What does technology have to do with agriculture?

Step 1

Begin by explaining to students that in this lesson, they will be looking at technology in agriculture. Remind them that the definition of agriculture is

“Agriculture is the science, art, or practice of cultivating the soil, producing crops, and raising livestock and in varying degrees the preparation and marketing of the resulting products.” (Source)

Pose the following questions about this definition:

The word ‘art’ in this definition seems strange - why do you think it is included?
Suggested answer: Art means the application of human creative skills and imagination, and a lot of agriculture requires thinking creatively and imagining new ways of doing things to achieve goals.
Where might you see examples of creativity and imagination in agriculture?Suggested answer: Nowhere in agriculture will you see examples of creativity and imagination more than in the technology used by farmers to produce food and fibres.

Step 2

Invite students to explain what they think the term ‘technology’ means.

Lead them to a definition of technology, for example, “Technology is the use of knowledge to invent new devices or tools”. (Source)

Step 3

Now, ask for some examples of technology and write these on the board.

If students are familiar with the idea of technology, you might have a range of technologies suggested, including old and new. Did anyone think of the hammer or the wheel? According to the definition above, these would definitely fall under the category of technology.

Now, ask students to think about what types of technologies they would associate with agriculture or farming.

You might want to take a moment to explain the distinction between farming and agriculture to students. Farming is a part of agriculture that is mainly concerned with the growing and raising of plants and animals. Agriculture includes farming but is also about the science and research behind farming practices as well as the processing and sale of agricultural products. Agriculture is a much broader term than farming.

Some examples could include spades, rakes, tractors, ploughs, combine harvesters, drones and robots (yes, the robots are very busy in agriculture!).

Step 4

Invite students to look at the following images available on the attached visual explainer:

Pose the questions:

Why might farmers be interested in new technologies? Why might they be essential to farming?

Suggested answers could include:

saves time
can farm much larger areas
can work much faster over a larger area
don’t need to hire so many people (saves money)
don’t need to look after working animals
can stay on top of pests and diseases more easily and can treat them more quickly (it is easier and faster to spray crops with a tractor, plane or drone than it is by hand).

There are many videos on YouTube that showcase amazing examples of technology in the agricultural industry. If time permits, you could share some with students, such as this one on apple picking, this one on strawberry picking, or this one featuring a variety of different farming machinery and equipment.

Explain to students that in addition to these points, farmers are increasingly using technology on their farms to help them care for the natural environment while still growing food and fibre. They will explore some of these technologies in the next part of the lesson.

Find Out: Farmers using technology to care for the environment

Step 1

Explain to students that agriculture is now a massive industry in Australia and around the world, but that it also has huge environmental impacts; for example:

In 2020, agriculture was responsible for 13% of Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions (source)
Agriculture accounts for 55% of Australian land use (source)
Agriculture accounts for 24% of water extractions in Australia (water extractions means to take water from a source) (source)

Agriculture accounts for declining water quality in natural waterways and the ocean. Run-off from farms often contains contaminants that harm aquatic ecosystems, including in places like the Great Barrier Reef. (source)

Step 2

Explain to students that because agriculture is such a big business around the world, there are huge opportunities for technology to help farmers manage their farms and reduce their environmental impacts.

Share this video where we see how farmers in Queensland are using drone technology to apply pesticides more accurately in order to avoid polluting nearby waterways.

Using drones to save on pesticide costs and loss - Queensland Agriculture (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qj5tODEA1-w)

Once complete, invite students to suggest how technology is helping farmers. Through your discussion, consider the following:

time saved
accuracy
environmental impacts
farm productivity.

Step 3

Students will now explore some of the different environmental impacts of agriculture.

Share the Environmental Impacts of Agriculture fact sheet with them and invite them to read through it. As they read, encourage students to take note of any words, phrases or topics that they are unfamiliar with or need more help to understand. Are there any issues that they would like to explore more deeply?

This could be an extension task, or this lesson could be extended to give students more time to understand the environmental impacts of agriculture.

Step 4

Now, give students a copy of the Technology for a Better Farming Future fact sheet and ask them to read through it. Again, as they read, encourage students to take note of any words, phrases or topics that they are unfamiliar with or need more help to understand. Are there any technologies that they would like to explore more deeply?

Step 5

Break the class into pairs or small groups. Ask each group to select (or you could assign) a technology. In their groups, they should select three environmental impacts that they think their chosen technology would be best suited to addressing. For each environmental impact they select, they should answer the following questions (also available on the Student Worksheet):

Which environmental impact are we focusing on?
How could the technology we have chosen be used to address this environmental impact?
What might be a risk or problem with using this technology to help this environmental impact?

Once complete, students could share their answers to ONE environmental impact with the class or with another pair of students.

The aim here is for students to understand that there are huge opportunities for technology to be used in a way to help our environment and that maybe one technology can help with multiple environmental issues.

Take Action: Invent a technology for a farm

Step 1

Explain to students that they will now think about the environmental impacts of agriculture from the Environmental Impacts of Agriculture fact sheet and will design a technology that can help to address one or more of these impacts. Students could work in pairs or small groups to complete this task.

Remind students that “Agriculture is the science, art, or practice of cultivating the soil, producing crops, and raising livestock and in varying degrees, the preparation and marketing of the resulting products” (source) and that art is about creativity and imagination. Students are encouraged to be creative in their designs.

The technology could be something entirely new or could be inspired by the technologies on the Technology for a Better Farming Future fact sheet. The feasibility of this technology is not important; what is important is that there is evidence that students have creatively come up with a solution to one of the environmental impacts of agriculture and that they have met the following criteria for their design (also available on the Student Worksheet).

The technology you are designing must meet the following design criteria:

Criteria 1 - Address at least one of the environmental impacts of agriculture
Criteria 2 - Help the farmer with their farming practice (i.e. it shouldn’t make more work for the farmer or interfere with the production or food or fibre)

The steps for designing this technology could be:

Selecting one environmental impact to address (if more fit with the technology that is designed, these can be added later)
Brainstorm ideas for technologies
Start doing some rough sketches and doodles of designs
Draw a prototype of the design
Test this prototype against the two criteria - tweak the design to meet the criteria
Share the prototype with another pair or group for feedback - incorporate feedback into the design
Create a final version of the design - this could be a poster or a 3D model. This needs to include labels to explain features of the design and a paragraph justifying the design (i.e. how does it meet the design criteria.

Step 2

Once complete, provide an opportunity for students to share their designs with an audience, such as another class or by recording a class video that can be shared with families.

Reflection

Each group could swap their design with another group and use the following questions to assess and reflect on each others’ designs (questions also available on the Student Worksheet):

How well do you think this design addresses the environmental impact? Explain your answer.
How well do you think this design will help the farmers with their work? What is good, and what could be improved?
How clear was the design?
What was your favourite thing about this design?
What questions do you still have about this design?
What is one thing you would improve about the design?

Technology and Agriculture

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