Year 8 - Lesson 1 - Rainforests
Welcome Year 8 Students
In this series of online lessons, you will explore not only rainforests generally; what is it they do and how they do it, but you will also explore with me the Australian Daintree Rainforest as I work with the Earthwatch Institute and their scientists in the field. Click HERE to read about the research. Click HERE to read about the location.
Lesson 1
In this lesson you will:
Create your own definition for what a wet tropical rainforest is.
Explore the extent of the Queensland Daintree Rainforest
Begin to create a series of map overlays for the various facets of the rainforest we will be exploring.
* Task - Tropical rainforests are extremely important to the health of the planet. Often they have been described as the heart and lungs of the planet.
In no more than 40 - 50 words write why you think this might be so?
These sites might be interesting for that:
* Task - What are some of the things that define a tropical rainforest?
That is: What is a Tropical Rainforest and how can we tell it from some other kind of forest?
Some good information is on this website, but there are loads more -
Try and find 3 more sites that agree with the definitions here:
* Task - Download and print the “Natural Vegetation Regions” sheet and colour in the map according to the key on the side of the map.
* Task - What sorts of patterns can you see when you compare the locations of the rainforests of the world?
Are there any other vegetation patterns you can also see?
* Task - The Daintree rainforest is located on the Queensland Coast search for some more exact descriptions of its location – get both a basic spatial description and latitude and longitude of its boundaries. Compare the map found HERE with the google satellite image found on Google Maps.
You will need to navigate your way to the Daintree on google maps. You will also need to zoom out far enough to be able to see the whole of the region.
Print out the attached Queensland Base Map attached. Using tracing paper, create your first overlay for this series of lessons which shows the full extent of the Daintree Rainforest. You will be doing other overlays in later lessons so keep your finished work safe.