YEAR 7 - YEAR 8
Join an Education Officer live from the comfort of your own classroom and connect with nature on an adventure through the magnificent forests of the Dandenong Ranges.
Students will observe and analyse various technologies and energy sources used by the Railway throughout its history. By understanding forces, tools, materials, engineering systems and the costs required by the railway they will investigate and brainstorm ways to create an innovative new Railway product, that is sustainable for the future. They will research challenges to the railway over time and the importance and historical significance of people and volunteers to the Railway. Students will undertake a virtual tour on the railway and will think sustainably about the impacts of the railway and future solutions to reduce the environmental impacts of people and technology to biodiversity at the railway, locally, regionally, and globally. Students consider design options with society, ethics, economic and social sustainability factors in mind. Students think critically, use creativity, innovation, and enterprise skills with increased independence, gathering information to develop design solutions that contribute positively to meet Puffing Billy Railway’s community needs for a sustainable future.
During their virtual visit!
With the guidance of a Puffing Billy Railway Education Officer students will engage in online content and be immersed amongst wildlife and habitats on their journey through the Dandenong Ranges. Students will learn valuable observation and classification skills to determine various technologies and energy sources used by the Railway throughout its history. By understanding tools, materials, engineering systems and the costs that are required by the railway they will investigate ways to create a Railway product that is sustainable for the future.
They will investigate challenges to the railway over time and the importance and historical significance of people and volunteers to the Railway. Using design theory students will develop innovative and sustainable designs to evolve the Railway in the future. Students consider advantages and disadvantages of design ideas and technologies, including safety and risk. Students consider design options with society, ethics, economic and social sustainability factors in mind. Students use creativity, innovation and enterprise skills with increased independence.
Curriculum links
| Curriculum Area | Strand | Sub-Strand | Content Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design and Technologies | Technologies and Society | How people in design and technologies occupations consider ethical factors to design and produce products, services and environments (VC2TDE8S01) | |
| The impacts of innovation and the development of technologies on designed solutions for ethical considerations including sustainable living (VC2TDE8S02) | |||
| Technologies Contexts | Engineering principles and systems | Analyse how force, motion and energy are used to manipulate and control engineered systems that are ethical (VC2TDE8C01) | |
| Materials and technologies specialisations | Analyse how characteristics and properties of tools, materials, systems and components can be selected, manipulated and combined to create designed solutions that are ethical (VC2TDE8C04) | ||
| Creating Designed Solutions | Investigating and defining | Explain needs or opportunities for designing, and investigate and select tools, materials, processes and components to create designed solutions (VC2TDE8D01) | |
| Generating and designing | Generate, iterate and communicate design ideas, decisions and processes using technical terms and graphical representation techniques, using manual and digital tools (VC2TDE6D02) | ||
| Producing and implementing | Select, explain and use suitable materials, components, tools and techniques to safely make designed solutions (VC2TDE6D03) | ||
| Evaluating | Negotiate design criteria that address ethical considerations, including sustainability, to evaluate design ideas, processes and solutions (VC2TDE6D04) | ||
| Science | Science as Human Endeavour | Physical Sciences | Balanced and unbalanced forces acting on objects, including gravitational force, may be investigated and represented using force diagrams; changes in an object�s motion can be related to its mass and the magnitude and direction of the forces acting on it (VC2S8U14) |
| Energy exists in different forms, including thermal, chemical, gravitational and elastic, and may be classified as kinetic or potential; energy transfers (conduction, convection and radiation) and transformations occur in simple systems and can be analysed in terms of energy efficiency (VC2S8U15) | |||
| Household energy consumption can be analysed using an energy audit and is affected by appliance choice, building design, season and climate (VC2S8U16) | |||
| Science Understanding | Biological Sciences | Matter and energy flow through ecosystems and can be represented using models, including food webs and food pyramids; populations will be affected by changing biotic and abiotic factors in an ecosystem including habitat loss, climate change, seasonal migration and introduction or removal of species (VC2S8U04) | |
| Science Inquiry | Questioning and Predicting | Investigable questions, reasoned predictions and hypotheses can be developed in guiding investigations to identify patterns, test relationships and analyse and evaluate scientific models (VC2S8I01) | |
| Planning and conducting | Reproducible investigations to answer questions and test hypotheses can be planned and conducted, including identifying independent, dependent and controlled variables where applicable, stating assumptions, recognising and managing risks, considering ethical issues and following protocols when accessing cultural sites and artefacts on Country and Place (VC2S8I02) | ||
| Processing, modelling and analysing | Data and information can be organised and processed by selecting and constructing representations including tables, graphs, keys, models and mathematical relationships (VC2S8I04) | ||
| Information and processed data can be analysed to show patterns, trends and relationships, and to identify anomalies (VC2S8I05) | |||
| Evaluating | Scientific methods, conclusions and claims can be analysed to identify assumptions, possible sources of error, conflicting evidence and unanswered questions (VC2S8I06) | ||
| Evidence-based arguments can be constructed to support conclusions or evaluate claims, including consideration of ethical issues and protocols associated with using or citing secondary data or information (VC2S8I07) | |||
| Communicating | Communicating ideas, findings and arguments for specific purposes and audiences involves the selection and use of appropriate presentation formats, scientific vocabulary, models and other representations, and may include the use of digital tools (VC2S8I08) | ||
| Visual Arts | Developing Practices | Reflect on, analyse and document their own and others� visual arts practices to inform decisions they make in the exploration, development and resolution of their artworks (VC2AVA8D02) | |
| Creating | Select and manipulate visual conventions, visual arts processes and materials to create artworks (VC2AVA8C01) | ||
| Exploring | Investigate ways that visual conventions, visual arts processes and materials are used to communicate ideas, perspectives and meaning in artworks created across cultures, times, places and other contexts (VC2AVA8E01) | ||
| Mathematics | Number | Find percentages of quantities and express one quantity as a percentage of another, with and without digital tools (VC2M7N07) | |
| Statistics | Distinguish between a population and a sample, and investigate techniques for data collection including census, sampling, experiment and observation, and explain the practicalities and implications of obtaining data through these techniques (VC2M8ST01) | ||
| Analyse and report on the distribution of data from primary and secondary sources using random and non-random sampling techniques (VC2M8ST02) | |||
| Personal and Social Capability | Social awareness and management | Collaboration | Situations that benefit from collaboration; strategies for setting team goals; and ways team members can support one another to achieve team goals (VC2CP8O04) |
Curriculum Resources
Puffing Billy Railway offers a range of pre and post excursion curriculum-linked resources to support teaching and learning in the classroom and at home. All resources are based around the topics of Energy, Force and Motion, Past and Present, Design and Technology and Biodiversity.
Gravity gurus
Tools in technology
Mobile magic
Save our species
Who's in charge?
The power of volunteers
Ideas and innovations
Conservation in action
Teachers are welcome to download this workbook for the students to use while they are onsite at Puffing Billy Railway.
- Innovation Station Workbook |Â Download
Enquiries
Enquire about our guided excursions via our online form.
Please contact the Education team for any further questions by emailing [email protected]Â or calling 03 9757 0700.
