Martin Pluss

Hi all,

Just recently I took Year 10 to Long Reef and Collaroy Beach to study coastal management.

Pre Fieldwork Activities.

Students are introduced to the area through Google Maps and other relevant information on the web.

The school intranet is use to give access to documents ready for students to use. One of them is a template on the Research Action Plan. We use the fieldwork to show how research can be carried out in the field.

Fieldwork Day

The students have a standard sheet to fill out while they undertake primary research. Also without encouragement photos are taken of the key coastal processes and management. The aim is to highlight the natural ecosystem at Long Reef and the mainly human modified ecosystem at Collaroy Beach.

Post Fieldwork Activities

Two main activities are the focus. Students are to write a report of one section of the fieldwork using the template. The goal of this activity is to:

1. Consolidate learning about coastal management

2. Introduce the concept of original research which is the basis of the Research Action Plan which is the basis of the next unit of work.

Well how can we make use of Web 2.0 Tools? My sole goal was to introduce the students to online picture galleries to store more academic photos for their learning. This involved introducing them to a variety on places to store pictures online. Of particular importance was to encourage them to take photos of scenes rather than their peers in the photos for privacy reasons.

Down the track I would like to develop a database of the student work over the years and see the changes in the area as successive students undertake the research.

Now to the Geography

Long Reef is essentially a natural ecosystem compared to Collaroy which is more built up.

It has a natural dune system compared to one overtaken by the built environment.

In addition the contrast in storm water outlets was evident.

Anyway just some thoughts.

Cheers Martin

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