Journey from the desert to the ocean depths.
The South Australian Biodiversity Gallery shows South Australian animals in their habitats. It also gives insights into biological processes. Choose from the Article Index (right) for programs in this exhibition. See also our World Mammals exhibition for more curriculum links.
Pre-visit
Before your visit, introduce your students to the gallery with the Biodiversity Gallery News:
Is sustainablitily your priority?
There is an excellent sustainability DVD that can be seen in the exhibition, but school groups seldom have time to view it. However, it is also available from the museum shop. ($19.95 delivered.) Click here for details.
Another resource is the Barbera Hardy Institute sustainability video on YouTube
Composite classes?
Some students may use one set of resources while others are using different resources in the gallery if you have a composite class and wish to mix and match.
In your school
Your school can borrow Discovery Cases of insects, spiders and marine life.
More Resources
The museum now has an exciting partnership with the Zoom Lens Project – a Zoom Trail Map and teacher extension activity. Add this activity to your gallery program if your class has participated in the Zoom Lens program. Find out about Zoom Lens.
For resources from the Natural resource Management Boards, including education packs, online assets and Youth Voice contacts, visit NRM Education
Museum Safari: Year 1
Where do animals live? What do they do?
These cards have been written for parents or other adults to read to students in various parts of the South Australian Museum's Biodiversity Gallery. They focus students' attention on animal features and habitats.
- Living things have a variety of external features
- Living things live in different places where their needs are met
- Exploring what happens when habitats change
Check our World Mammals exhibtion for more curriculum links.
How they grow: Year 2
These pages have been written for parents or other adults to read to students in various parts of the South Australian Museum’s Biodiversity Gallery. They focus attention on many examples of animals growing up in the South Australian bush. Each page is a stand-alone activity, so parents can work independently with small groups in the gallery.
The program links to the Year 2 Australian Science Curriculum, particularly the biology understandings:
- Living things grow, change and have offspring similar to themselves
- Exploring different characteristics of life stages in animals
- Observing that all animals have offspring, usually with two parents
- Participate in guided investigations to explore and answer questions
- Accessing information sources
Observing Animals: Year 3
This program is suited to the Engage or Explore phase of a unit of work focussing on the idea that living things can be grouped on the basis of observable features and that living things have features in common. A visit to the gallery could also be used as part of the Elaboration phase of such a unit by asking students to complete tasks based on their classroom investigations.
Pre-visit Research
The program will be most effective if students already have a working knowledge of the terms; mammals, reptiles, spiders, insects, fish, birds, amphibians and crustaceans. You might wish to add some others to extend the program – molluscs, plants, sponges and monotremes are possibilities.
Life Cycles: Year 4
This program involves students researching South Australian animals at school and then finding the actual animals in the museum and sharing their stories.
Before the museum visit students to read and discuss ideas about growth and development using the resources below, supplemented by their own research. At the museum they find the animals they have been researching and share their research with other class members.
You can find a more detailed explanation of the program in the teacher information below:
Cycle of Life (PDF)
Cycle of Life in PowerPoint:
Download this version of the Cycle of Life document to use on interactive whiteboards or in computer suites.
View Online (currently being developed)
Using Video Cameras: Years 4–8
Students watch a documentary video made by a museum scientist and then try their hand at creating their own in the gallery, combining Science with English.
Curriculum links
The Literacy sub-strand Interacting with others is the main link to the English curriculum, while the Science link is to Science Understandings.
Logistics
For this program students will need to be in groups of four, with at least one adult supervisor for every two groups.A couple of groups of three may be necesssary to even out numbers, but no more than eight groups can be accommodated.
Some experience with hand-held video cameras would be an advantage, but not essential. (The program uses Flip Cameras.) Students will have a half hour to explore the gallery before an Education Officer introduces the video program. The program itself will take a further hour. Raw video footage will be collected for editing and compiling back at school
View an example of a scientist's video is below:
Animal Adaptations: Year 5
This program encourages students to discuss the structural features and adaptations that living things have to help them survive in their environment. It is designed to encourage student collaboration and interaction – powerful learning tools.
The program requires students to be organised in collaborative groups of four (with some groups of three if necessary to balance numbers).
Program Logistics
Each group needs a set of booklets, which are available for loan from the museum security desk when your class arrives. The booklets have information and questions on each page. However each individual booklet has some missing sections. Group members must share information from their book with those group members who lack it, so that everyone has the facts and knows the questions.
Please ensure students have their own paper to write on and return the booklets to the security desk unmarked.
The files below are provided for your information. They contain a complete version of the texts so you can check that the concepts, vocabulary and other factors are appropriate for your students. Remember, the version each student receives will have some information missing.
Check our World Mammals exhibtion for more curriculum links.
Audio Tour: Year 5
This special program can only be accessed with an Education Officer or Volunteer.
Hand-held MP3 players (a class set is available) give students independent tours through the gallery, focusing on the adaptations of animals to various habitats. Hand-held MP3 players (a class set is available) give students independent tours through the gallery, focusing on the idea that living things have structural features and adaptations that help them to survive in their environment with references to the idea of sustainability.
Students need to be in groups of three to five, each group supervised by an adult. Book early because this program can only be done with museum staff, .
Listen to a sample of the program below:
Growth and Survival: Year 6
This program is for students investigating how the growth and survival of living things are affected by the physical conditions of their environment. (Australian Science Curriculum; Biology; Year 6.)
The program consists of a set of swap cards, available for loan at the museum or downloadable from the museum’s website. Each card has two questions relating to the theme. The first can be answered by reference to a computer touch screen by the appropriate display. The second question requires students to also use observation, inference or general knowledge.
Preview the Swap Cards to decide whether to print them yourself, or borrow copies from the museum.
Possible answers to the questions on the cards and suggestions for working with Swap Card data back at school are available.
Grouping Animals: Year 7
This program explains and elaborates techniques and uses for animal classification. The booklet Grouping Animals (below) can be reproduced for each student. However it contains more activities than can be achieved in the average one hour visit, so teachers may;
- select some of the pages for their students
- allow students to select their own pages
- allocate different pages to groups so that not all students do the same pages
The gallery is rich and diverse, so it is important that students are given an opportunity to look around the gallery and make their own discoveries before the booklet pages are handed out.
Pre-visit research
This is not an introductory program. Before using it students need some background in classification. They need to have some familiarity with classification terms such as Order, Family, Genus, Species. It would be beneficial for students to have used a simple classification key and to know the names of some of the major animal groups such as mammals, reptiles, insects, arachnids and others (listed in the teachers’ notes.)
Check our World Mammals exhibtion for more curriculum links.
Investigating Ecosystems: Year 9
Ecosystems consist of communities of interdependent organisms and abiotic components of the environment. (Australian Science Curriculum, Biology Year 9).
This program involves students in collecting evidence from museum exhibits for various interactions animals have between their environment and each other. Students are asked to investigate carnivores' roles, animals' competition for resources, parasite/host interactions, the role of insects in ecosystems, migration, extinctions and drought as an abiotic influence on survival.
Download the Teacher Information and Activity Sheets below:
Teacher Information & Activity Sheets
Evolution: Year 10
This program explores evidence for the theory of Evolution by Natural Selection. It has two documents for students to use.
The first document, Thoughts About Evolution, is a reading guide with questions to use BEFORE visiting the museum. It sets the scene for the visit and can be used in class or it can be set for homework. (There are two versions of this guide. They both have the same text, but one has space for students to record their answers, while the other does not. Use the version you prefer.)
The second, More Thoughts About Evolution, is a booklet designed for use in the museum. It directs students to museum exhibits that are examples of the ideas discussed in the previous document.
Thoughts About Evolution – pre-visit reading (version without space to write answers)
Thoughts About Evolution – pre-visit reading (version with space to write answers)
More Thoughts About Evolution – for use in the museum
Systems: Years 11–12
Education Officers can lead senior students in explorations of the gallery to focus on either internal and external systems (physiology and ecology) or adaptive systems (evolution).
Book early because Education Officer lessons often fill quickly.
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