What's in a name - Teacher's Notes

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Introduction to the Teacher's Notes

The educational section of the website has been designed to offer teachers a “user-friendly” resource:

There are four curriculum strands, and these are colour-coded:

1. Orange = English
2. Red = Science
3. Green = Arts (meaning creative and visual arts)
4. Blue = SOSE (including humanities – history, geography)

For each topic there are three sections:

1. A home page outlines the relationship between the broad topic (place names) and the curriculum area, you will find here some broad ideas additional to those developed in the lesson and worksheet pages;

2. The lesson pages offer lesson plans to teachers based on a template of:

lesson description

lesson aim and objectives;

materials needed.

3. Worksheets, where appropriate, deliver the lessons to the students.
Up to four lessons are detailed in each curriculum area in order to accommodate classes from upper primary to mid-secondary.

This range is divided into levels:
Level 1 indicates years 6-7,

Level 2 indicates years 7-8,

Level 3 indicates years 8-9,

Level 4 indicates years 9 - 10.

It is important to note these are only suggested activities that could be adapted and/or incorporated into planning and student learning. They are intended to be starting points and could be developed further to meet the needs of students.

It will be observed that the material on the site, all of which can be printed-out for classroom use, develops the broad principles of the video into specific topic (curriculum) areas. Use of the video as an engaging introduction to the idea that place names are important, and that they come from somewhere, may be considered a broadly useful way of introducing the subject into the classroom.

The treatment of the topic in the video, and the language used, have both been designed to make the program appealing across the whole target age range. As noted elsewhere the lesson material that follows contains some instances of cross-reference to or linkage with material in the video. This is noted in the text and instances are highlighted in green in the video Teacher’s Notes.

Teachers can then use the curriculum-specific materials that follow to develop the students’ broad understanding (achieved through the video) into any preferred subject area. As far as possible lessons have been designed to obviate the need for special resources and to limit reliance on worksheets that must be printed out to a minimum. Up to four lessons are detailed in each curriculum area in order to accommodate classes from upper primary to mid-secondary.

Teachers will find the website’s connection to external links and further resources of value if they wish to develop lesson plans beyond the scope of those given here, where the need to recognise variations in curricula across Australia imposes certain limitations on content.

About the Teacher's Notes

CGNA’s purpose in offering the educational features of this site is to encourage people to think about place names – where they come from of course, what they stand for, and how crucial they are, but also how all Australians can become involved in the naming of places.

This educational section of the website is in two parts. There is the video, “What’s in a Name?” hosted by Ernie Dingo. Teacher’s Notes suggesting ways of using this program follow (placement of the apostrophe is deliberate, the Notes have been prepared to assist individual teachers to prepare and deliver classes). Then there is the main education section, organised into four curriculum strands and explained in an Introduction Page


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