Rewild Your World
Week 3 - What is habitat Connectivity ?
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What is Habitat Connectivity?
Before introducing new ideas, revisit learning from the previous lesson sequence on biodiversity.
Prompt students to recall the meaning of biodiversity and why it is important.
Clarify any misconceptions to ensure students have a consolidated understanding before moving on.
To activate prior knowledge and make connections to new content, invite students to complete a quick reflective task:
Students trace their hand on paper.
On each finger, they write someone or something they feel connected to.
In the palm, they write their own definition of connectivity.
As a class, share and discuss ideas about connection and the different layers of connection in our lives. Display students’ ‘connection hands’ on tables and initiate a gallery walk providing time for students to view peers’ connections. Pause and discuss similarities and highlight any connection that are different from their own, encouraging students to reflect on personal perspectives and shared experiences.
Welcome to Week 3 of Rewild Your World! This week, you will be learning about habitat connectivity and how every part of nature is linked together. From bustling insects that pollinate flowers to birds that spread seeds, every living thing helps keep our planet healthy and full of life.
Animals need to move around their habitat to find food, water, shelter, and mates, When habitats are broken up by roads or cleared land, it becomes harder or even dangerous for them to travel, breed and live.
You will explore how things like roads, fences and cities can make life difficult for animals, and how we can help by creating corridors or safe pathways that connect habitats again. These links help animals move freely and keep ecosystems balanced.
Through stories, activities and reflection, you will start to see the world as one big web of life, where every living thing has an important job and how their lives connect in ways that means that they rely on each other. This week, you will begin to think like a nature protector, someone who helps living things stay connected so our planet can thrive.
Your Weekly Keywords
Each week, students will investigate a list of new words that connect to their learning about biodiversity and STEM. These words are like special tools that help young scientists share ideas, describe how nature works, and grow their scientific vocabulary.
You could introduce the idea of a scientist’s or explorer’s toolkit, where every new word becomes a tool for observing, questioning, explaining, and understanding the world. Just as scientists use instruments to explore nature, students can use language to make sense of what they discover.
Encourage conversation, teamwork, and reflection as students create their own definitions. This approach helps them think deeply, use language with care, and build confidence in expressing their ideas clearly and purposefully.
Each week, you’ll explore a new collection of important words linked to the learning journey ahead. Think of these words as treasures in an explorer’s pack. They’ll help you describe your discoveries, talk about what you see in nature, and sound like a real world-changer.
Begin by reading your task card carefully.
With a partner, try to explain what each word means using your own thoughts and ideas, rather than looking in a dictionary. Take your time and talk it through together. Building meanings as a team helps you understand deeply and express your ideas clearly.
When you’ve finished, share your explanations with another pair. Listen, compare, and see where your ideas match or differ. You might discover a clever new way to describe one of the words or learn something you hadn’t noticed before.
Quote of the Week – First Nations Wisdom
Give students a quiet moment to reflect on its meaning. Encourage them to think about what caring for the land looks like in everyday life and how nature, in turn, cares for us.
Invite students to discuss the quote with a partner and share one small action they could take this week to look after the land. This might be planting something new in the garden, reducing waste, learning about local animals, or simply spending time in nature.
Support students as they connect the words of the First Nations people to their own lives and their sense of responsibility for the Earth.
Guide them in creating their own quote cards inspired by this message. Encourage colour, creativity, and personal reflection. Observe how students show empathy, respect for Country, and awareness of their role as caretakers of the planet.
This week’s quote comes from First Nations teachings. It reminds us of the deep connection between people and the Earth:
“If you look after Country ,Country will look after you.”
These words teach an important truth about care and respect. When we look after the soil, plants, animals, and water around us, nature gives back by providing what we need to live and grow. It’s a gentle reminder that we are part of the same living system, not separate from it.
Take a moment to think about what this message means to you. How can we look after the land in our daily lives? What does it mean for the land to look after us in return?
Talk with a partner about one small action you could take this week to care for Country, perhaps planting a native tree, cleaning up a local park, or learning more about the traditional custodians of your area.
Then, use the quote card template to create your own message of care and respect for the planet. You might choose another Indigenous saying, or write your own words that express how humans and nature can look after one another.
Story of the Week - The Wolves of Yellowstone
Encourage students to read the story with a partner to build fluency, confidence, and shared understanding. Support them as they take turns reading aloud, using expression to bring the story and the landscape of Yellowstone to life.
Connect this story to previous lesson content - connectivity, biodiversity etc. Provide opportunity for students to explore local relevance - Australian examples.Discuss key vocabulary such as rewilding, ecosystem, keystone species, and biodiversity, linking these ideas to examples from Australia or your local environment.
Provide examples of keystone or influential species at different scales — for example, in a garden (native bees, worms), school grounds or local parks (magpies, blue-tongue lizards), and national park ecosystems (dingoes, Tasmanian devils). You may wish to briefly note that some species, such as Tasmanian devils, are endangered due to disease and habitat pressures.
This progression helps students connect new terms to familiar environments, build conceptual understanding from local to global contexts, and recognise that different species play important roles in maintaining ecosystem balance.
This week, you’ll explore the incredible true story of how wolves helped bring Yellowstone National Park back to life.
On your task card, you’ll find the story and some fascinating facts about how the return of just fourteen wolves changed an entire ecosystem. You’ll discover how these amazing animals helped rivers flow more smoothly, trees and plants grow tall again, and other creatures like beavers, birds, and fish return to their natural homes.
Read the story with a friend and talk about what happened. Why were the wolves so important to Yellowstone? What went wrong when they disappeared, and how did their return make such a big difference?
Then, think about your own surroundings. Are there animals or habitats near your school or community that need care and protection? What small actions could you take to help nature find its balance again?
Together, you’ll begin to understand how every living thing has a role to play and how rewilding can bring the heartbeat of nature back to life.
Comprehension – Sustainable Habitats and the Balance of Nature
Guide students through the reading, pausing to highlight key ideas about how animals meet their needs for food, water, shelter, and breeding, and how these connect to form a balanced and sustainable ecosystem. Encourage them to think about how different species depend on one another and discuss how even small changes in one part of a habitat can affect the whole environment.
After reading, invite students to reflect on what they have learnt by summarising the main points in their own words. Model how to pick out key facts and explain them clearly, focusing on meaning and understanding rather than copying from the text.
Encourage students to take short notes on the most useful facts and examples, explaining that these will help them later when they begin researching and planning how to protect or rewild their own chosen animal species.
This week, you will read an information text about how animals, plants, and environments work together to create balanced habitats. As you read, look for the key ideas that explain what makes a habitat sustainable, how animals compete for food, water, and shelter, and how every part of nature plays an important role in keeping ecosystems strong.
Think about how producers, consumers, and decomposers are linked through food chains and how changes at one level can affect every other level in the ecosystem. Notice what happens when predators disappear, when habitats are lost, or when there are too many of one kind of animal.
After reading, reflect on what helps animals survive in their habitats and how people can protect these environments. Consider how balance, competition, and connection all work together to support life.
As you work, take notes on the most important facts and ideas. These notes will help you later when you begin planning how to protect or rewild your own chosen animal species. Think about what lessons from this text could guide your future conservation choices.
Record Your Answers – How Far Can You Go?
Explain that there are 12 questions arranged across four levels, moving from simple recall to deeper critical thinking. Students should complete them in order, writing in full sentences and using facts from the text to support their ideas.
Model one think-aloud example to show how to find clues in the text and form a clear answer. Then give students quiet time to complete the task independently, allowing them to re-read the text as needed.
Encourage students to underline key words, make short notes in the margins, and use sentence starters to help build thoughtful answers. When finished, ask them to record the highest level reached and note one area they would like to improve next.
Observe each student’s comprehension, reasoning, written accuracy, perseverance, and ability to self-assess or ask for clarification when needed.
After reading the information about biodiversity, habitats, and ecosystems, you’ll answer 12 comprehension questions that increase in challenge. You’ll begin with Level 1 questions (simple recall) and work your way up to Level 4 (critical thinking).
Write your answers in full sentences, using facts and examples from the text to explain your ideas clearly. Take your time and move carefully through each question, seeing how far you can go.
If you reach a question that feels difficult, pause and think. That moment shows your understanding is growing and that you’re ready to explore new ideas about how living things stay connected in nature.
Threats to Habitats - Find the Solutions
Encourage students to analyse each threat by asking why it happens and how it affects ecosystems. Guide them to evaluate which solutions are practical and which might have unintended consequences.
Support small-group discussions where students compare ideas, justify their reasoning, and challenge one another respectfully. Emphasise that critical thinking means questioning, connecting, and reflecting before deciding. Observe how students move beyond simple answers to demonstrate deeper understanding and creativity in solving real environmental problems.Consider introducing examples of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander approaches to caring for Country that help reduce threats to ecosystems. These may include
caring for waterways
cultural burning practices
seasonal calendars guiding harvesting
protecting breeding areas
selective harvesting / taking only what is needed
knowledge passed through stories, songlines, Elder
Emphasise that these practices are diverse and place-based. Schools are encouraged to connect with their local Aboriginal community or AECG to ensure learning is culturally appropriate and respectful.
In this activity, you’ll look closely at the threats to biodiversity shown in the charts. Each one shows how human actions can make life difficult for animals, plants, and the environment.
Your job is to choose ten different threats from the list and think of creative ways to solve them. For example, if the problem is chemicals, you could check the cleaning products used in school and make posters to help people choose safer options.
Work together in groups to come up with your best ideas and write them in the Solutions to Threats table. For each threat, explain what could be done to make the world a safer, healthier place for all living things.
Try to be inventive, realistic, and kind — your ideas might even inspire real change!
Dear Minister – Letters for Change
Before drafting, support students to plan their ideas using a graphic organiser, mind map or prompt sheet. This helps them organise their explanation of the threat, proposed solutions, evidence, action plan, and invitation for partnership.
After drafting, provide time for students to share their letter with a peer and exchange constructive feedback using simple criteria (e.g. clarity, tone, evidence, organisation). Encourage students to revise their writing based on this feedback before final submission.
Optional to provide students with a planning template and a peer-feedback checklist
Guide students through the model letter, pointing out effective techniques such as:
Using polite and purposeful language.
Explaining local issues clearly with evidence from their research.
Showing optimism and action rather than blame.
Ending with an invitation that encourages partnership and dialogue.
Persuasive writing is a balance between facts and feelings
Encourage students to personalise their letters so each one feels genuine and heartfelt. You might wish to discuss audience awareness — writing to a leader means balancing confidence, respect, and persuasion.
Once complete, collect the letters, review them for clarity and tone, and prepare them for posting as a single class package. This simple act helps students see how their voices can inspire real-world environmental change.
You’ve identified threats to local habitats and created thoughtful solutions to help restore nature. Now, it’s time to share your findings with someone who can make a difference.
In this activity, you’ll read an example letter written by Gavin. You’ll also look at a set of writing tips that will help you use the right language and tone. Then, you’ll write your own persuasive letter to your local member of council or environmental minister.
Your goal is to:
Explain the threats you’ve identified and the creative solutions you’re putting into action.
Use persuasive and respectful language that encourages the minister to visit your school.
End your letter with a clear invitation for them to come and see what your class is doing to protect local habitats and improve connectivity.
When everyone has finished, all the letters will be placed together in one envelope. Your teacher will post them to the address of your local member. And who knows — perhaps the minister will visit your school to continue the conversation and see your amazing work in person!
Activity – Reading the Landscape
Before students begin, revise how to read a grid on a map. Model how to identify horizontal and vertical references and record coordinates accurately. Demonstrate this process using the example map before students locate features on their own.
This activity encourages students to explore how digital tools like Google Maps can support geographical and environmental understanding. By switching between satellite and street views, students practise reading both visual data (roads, trees, rivers, buildings) and combining it with their local knowledge (pets, pollution, fencing, or chemical use).
As they identify and record threats using coordinates, students learn to interpret spatial data accurately while considering multiple perspectives.
Encourage them to discuss how technology helps us see patterns from above, while our lived experiences fill in the unseen details on the ground. This combination of visual interpretation and local understanding deepens critical thinking and helps students make informed conclusions about how animals move safely through their local landscape.
In this activity, you’ll be exploring the world around you using a satellite map. You’ll start by looking at where you live from three different views – the city view, the neighbourhood view, and then zoom right in to your local area.
Use Google Maps to find your school or home, then switch to Satellite View. Take a screenshot of your map and paste it into the grid we’ve provided.
Once you have your map, start looking for things that might be threats to animals that live nearby. These could include roads, bridges, fences, cleared land, pets, or chemical sprays. Some of these hazards are easy to see from above, while others come from your own local knowledge – what you know about your area.
After you’ve studied our example map, use your own map to plot the threats you find. Write down their coordinates and explain how you know what each threat is. Remember, these threats might affect some animals but not others – so think about how each one might change the way animals move, feed, or live in your area.
Habitat Connectivity - Threats In Action
Guide students to explore how animals travel through different environments and face obstacles such as roads, fences, and human activity. Encourage discussion about how connectivity supports survival. The teacher may need to distribute an aerial image of the school for all students to use as a base map.
Support students as they research local species, identify possible threats, and draw realistic routes showing safe pathways. Emphasise collaboration, creative thinking, and practical problem-solving throughout the task.Before students begin, revise how to read a simple map or aerial image, including how to recognise features such as buildings, gardens, playing fields, roads and tree lines.
Model how to use and create a key (legend) to label map features clearly (e.g. roads, safe corridors, water sources, shelters), so students can record threats and safe pathways consistently on their own maps.
Model using one animal example (e.g. magpie) to show how to trace a possible movement pathway between two points (food → water → shelter) while identifying barriers and corridors.
In this activity, you’ll learn how animals move around their environment and what dangers they face along the way. First, read about the three animals shown here – the Eastern Rosella, Sugar Glider, and Echidna – and look carefully at how each one travels from Point A to Point B while trying to stay safe. Notice how fences, roads, and gardens affect their journeys.
Then, you’ll choose three animals from your local area and research how they might move across your school or neighbourhood. Use Google Maps to get a bird’s-eye view of your area and think about the threats your animals might face, such as roads, pets, or a lack of trees.
Finally, use the template to draw your animals’ journeys from Point A to Point B, showing how they would find food, water, and shelter while avoiding dangers. Once complete, share your maps and explain how each animal depends on connectivity to survive and thrive in your local environment.
Activity: Eddie the Echidna’s Big Adventure – Create Your Own Wildlife Comic!
Guide students to explore the journey from an animal’s point of view, encouraging empathy and perspective-taking.
Discuss how fences, roads, and human activity impact wildlife movement and survival. Model how to express an animal’s thoughts and feelings through captions or dialogue. Emphasise understanding the creature’s needs rather than simply describing events
Observe how students communicate the animal’s perspective and awareness of environmental connectivity in their storytelling and visual choices.
Before students begin, activate prior knowledge by discussing what makes a comic.
Prompt students to consider:
• What is a comic?
• Have you read one before? What did you notice?
• Do comics always use words?
• How do pictures and text work together to tell a story?
• Why are speech bubbles, captions and panels useful?
• What information comes from images vs. words?
Highlight that comics communicate meaning through imagery, layout, sequencing, and selective text. Encourage students to think about how visual choices (e.g., colour, size, expression) help the audience understand the animal’s journey, feelings, and environment.
You’ve just read the story of Eddie the Echidna, who faced many dangers while searching for food. This comic strip showed how fences, roads, poisons, and pets can make life hard for wildlife. Without connectivity in our environment, animals can struggle to find food, water, shelter, or a safe path — sometimes putting them in real danger.
Now it’s your turn to think like an animal!
Choose a creature that lives in your local environment — it could be a bird, lizard, insect, frog, or any wild animal nearby.
Imagine its journey through the world. What dangers might it face? What helps it survive?
Use the blank comic strip template to tell its story from the animal’s point of view, just like Eddie’s adventure.
Add captions and speech bubbles to make it fun, educational, and easy for younger children to understand.
Present your comic to a younger class and explain what it teaches about connectivity — how all parts of nature are linked and why safe pathways for wildlife matter.
When everyone has finished, your class will collect all the comics into one book and upload it to The Dear World Library so the whole world can read your stories and learn from your work.
Weekly Mindfulness – The Art of Nature
This activity invites students to slow down and practise careful, mindful observation with a focus on habitat connectivity. Encourage quiet time outdoors where possible, or observation through a window if needed.
Model how to observe with intention. Use the example provided to demonstrate noticing fine details such as patterns in leaves, gaps between trees, small movement pathways or how different natural elements connect. Emphasise looking for relationships rather than simply drawing an object.
Reinforce that this is not about artistic perfection. It is about attention, curiosity and noticing.
Observe:
• Students’ ability to sustain focus
• Depth of observation rather than surface description
• Recognition of connections between living and non living elements
• Use of descriptive language in reflections
• Willingness to think creatively about how animals might use the spaceEncourage students to share insights respectfully and build on one another’s observations, strengthening both ecological awareness and reflective thinking.
This week, you will spend quiet time observing nature, with a special focus on habitat connectivity.
If possible, go outside to the playground, your garden or a nearby park. If you cannot go outside, sit near a window and carefully observe what you can see.
Bring your sketchbook and slow yourself down. Look closely at the small details. How are plants connected to other plants? Where might insects travel? Can you see natural pathways between trees, grass or garden beds?
Think about how animals might use these spaces. Is there shelter? Is there food? Is there a safe way to move from one place to another?
First, look at the example provided. Then draw what you notice. You may also write a few sentences to describe what you see, feel or wonder.
This is your time to pause, observe carefully and notice how everything in nature is linked together.
Your Digital Résumé – Experience 3
This week, students will create Experience 3 for their digital résumé. Ask them to reflect on a moment from this week that felt meaningful to their learning or growth. It might be researching local environmental threats, writing letters to leaders, or recognising how their own choices can help nature stay connected.
Guide students to take three photographs that represent their learning journey this week, capturing real actions, discoveries, or moments of reflection. Encourage them to choose one image that best expresses what they have learnt and write a thoughtful reflection about it. Their writing should explore what they observed, how it made them feel, and what impact it could have on themselves, their peers, and their wider community.
Support students to understand that every action, no matter how small, contributes to positive change. Encourage them to see their reflections as part of a growing story that celebrates connection, responsibility, and care for the natural world.
Throughout this course, you will continue to build your own digital résumé. It will be a personal portfolio that captures your learning journey and allows you to collect your work, celebrate your growth, and reflect on what has shaped you along the way.
This week, you will be adding your third experience, a reflection on what you found most meaningful or impactful. It might be researching threats to nature, writing your letter to the minister, or realising how small actions can protect the planet.
As the weeks continue, your résumé will grow into a beautiful record of your development. By the end of the course, it will not only show what you have achieved but also reveal who you are becoming, a learner, a thinker, and a person who cares deeply about making a positive difference in the world.
Share Your Thoughts on Dear World
This week, students will create and share their Dear World story with a focus on responsibility. Guide them to reflect on what they have learned about habitat connectivity and the duty humans have to ensure animals and insects can live safely beside us.
Encourage students to choose one meaningful moment from the week, perhaps realising how roads, tree removal or human activity affect wildlife. Support them to explain how their thinking has changed and what it means to act as an ambassador for nature.
Help students shape their reflection into a short, purposeful story that highlights growth, awareness and action. Prompt them to consider what others could learn from their new sense of responsibility.
Once complete, students will upload their story to the Dear World Library, including photos or evidence of their learning where appropriate. Celebrate reflections that show maturity, compassion and a genuine commitment to protecting our shared planet.
This week, your story should focus on responsibility.
You have learned that we have moved into the neighbourhoods of animals and insects. By building roads and cutting down trees, we have changed how they live and travel. With that knowledge comes responsibility.
In your Dear World story, reflect on:
• What you now understand about our duty to protect wildlife
• How your thinking has changed
• What it feels like to act as an ambassador for nature and habitat connectivity
• What others could learn from your new sense of responsibility
Upload your reflection to the Dear World Library and include any photos or evidence of your learning.
Use your voice to show that small actions matter. When we take responsibility, we help create a safer, more connected world for all living things.
Week 3 Quiz and Responsibility Certificate
Week 3 focuses on responsibility as a core skill. This is the third of ten certificates students will collect across the course, with each week highlighting a different skill that contributes to their overall growth.
Students complete the weekly quiz by clicking the online link provided. It can be done independently in class or at home. You may encourage discussion with a partner before submission to help refine thinking and deepen understanding. However, each child must complete and submit their own quiz, as certificates are awarded individually.
Frame this as reflection and consolidation rather than assessment. This is not a test. It is an opportunity for students to consider what responsibility means in the context of protecting living things and caring for the world around them.
As students complete the quiz, observe:
• Ownership of their learning
• Care and thoughtfulness in their responses
• Digital confidence and independence
• Perseverance when reflecting on complex ideas
• Evidence that they understand the connection between actions and consequences
• Continued growth in accuracy and depth across the weeksAcross the ten weeks, students are building a collection of certificates that represent ten essential life skills. Responsibility is a powerful one, as it moves learning from understanding into action.
This week you learned about habitat connectivity and how living things depend on safe, connected spaces to survive. You explored how roads, fences and human actions can break these connections and what we can do to help.
At the end of the week, you will complete a short online quiz. It will help you reflect on:
• How animals move through habitats
• What happens when habitats are fragmented
• Why our choices matter
This is not a test. It is a chance to show what you understand.
Once you finish, you will receive your Week 3 Responsibility Certificate. This shows that you understand how actions affect nature and how you can help protect our connected world.
Remember, there are ten certificates to collect. Each one represents a new skill you are building on your journey.
