Everyday Explorers: Australia and New Zealand

Leah Walton2021-11-16T11:12:32-05:00

Welcome to Our Everyday Explorers: Australia and New Zealand Homeschool Geography Curriculum

Want to travel to Australia and New Zealand from the comfort of your own home? Everyday Explorers: Australia and New Zealand is the perfect answer! In each homeschool geography unit, students focus on a different state or territory of Australia. Through text-based lessons, activities, notebook pages, and links to additional information, students can virtually explore the areas discussed in the day’s lesson.

Getting Started with Our Everyday Explorers: Australia and New Zealand Homeschool Geography Course

The Everyday Explorers: Australia and New Zealand homeschool geography course allows students of all ages to study interesting facts about Australia and New Zealand and the history of these nations. A different state or territory of Australia is visited in each homeschool geography unit, with detours to explore New Zealand, the Cook Islands, and Niue. There are activities, interesting facts, and links that can help the student virtually explore the areas being discussed in the day’s lesson. A study of native Australian animals is included in the “Build a Zoo” feature. Activities to study the animals are included and targeted to different grade levels so any age student can benefit from this geography course. Answer keys are included where appropriate.

Overview

32 weeks, 5 days a week
Includes text-based lessons, activities, notebooking pages, links to additional information, and answer keys
Grades Kindergarten – 12th

Supplies Needed

Corresponding lessons on SchoolhouseTeachers.com; 3-ring binder for writing assignments, notetaking, research, and Build a Zoo project; Zookeeper’s journal download under “Build a Zoo Instructions – Bilby: Week One” for appropriate grade level

What to Do

Go to Class Lessons and download the lesson plan. Start with the Day 1 instructions to download additional files for the first lesson. Follow the instructions each day on the lesson plan and check them off when completed.

Course Sample for Our Everyday Explorers: Australia and New Zealand Homeschool Geography Course

Explore the history of a different state of Australia or area of New Zealand one unit at a time. This section covered two days of our adventure in Tasmania.

The Cadbury Chocolate Factory, Day One

We have one more place I really want to show you in Tasmania. It’s quite possibly the tastiest stop of all—the Cadbury chocolate factory! We won’t be allowed into the areas where they actually make the chocolates, but we can spend some time in the visitor’s centre, taste-test a few things, and learn a bit about chocolate. Do you want to go?

Chocolate has had many different uses throughout history. It was a special drink for the Mayan Indians (who even used it as a type of money). Of course, we all know it as a favorite dessert of people all over the world.

Cocoa trees grow in the tropical regions of the world. The trees grow cocoa pods that are harvested twice a year. Each tree will produce twenty or thirty pods each year, and it takes everything one tree can grow in a year to yield just 450 mgs of chocolate!

Before those cocoa beans become tasty chocolate, they have to be harvested, fermented, dried, bagged, winnowed, roasted, and grinded—all before the beans can be pressed to make cocoa butter. Cocoa butter is just one of the key ingredients in the chocolates we enjoy today.

Here is a website that will get you started exploring.

The notebooking pages in your Explorer Pack (found below lesson two) will guide you through the next two days of our expedition!

To view a full sample of this class, click here.

Course Outline for Our Everyday Explorers: Australia and New Zealand Homeschool Geography Course

Nine Everyday Explorers: Australia and New Zealand homeschool geography units and the “Build a Zoo” feature take students across Australia and New Zealand, exploring historic locations and meeting exotic animals. Geography activities are provided for Kindergarten-2nd grade, 3rd-6th grade, and 7th-12th grade.

Weeks 1-4: Australian Capital Territory
Weeks 5-8: New South Wales
Weeks 9-12: Northern Territory
Weeks 13-16: Queensland
Weeks 17-20: South Australia
Weeks 21-24: Tasmania and Victoria
Weeks 25-28: Western Australia
Week 29: New Zealand: Bridge to NoWhere in Whanganui Nations Park, Clarks Flour Mill
Week 30: New Zealand: Larnach Castle, Museum of New Zealand
Week 31: New Zealand: National Library, Ophir Post Office, Waitomo Caves
Week 32: Cook Island and Niue: Mauke, Penryhn, Niue

More About Our Everyday Explorers: Australia and New Zealand Homeschool Geography Course

Everyday Explorers: Australia and New Zealand homeschool geography lessons lead students through exploring Australia, New Zealand, the Cook Islands, and even Niue along the way! Homeschool students expand their learning and fun by building their own zoos!

Each Everyday Explorers: Australia and New Zealand week is divided into three parts:

Days One through Four: Study various locations within a specific host region.

Day Five: Enjoy another installment of Build a Zoo!

So, grab a map and an adventurer’s spirit, and let’s go exploring!

Or, go straight to the lesson plan or course lessons.

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