AAEE Conference in Darwin

The Australian Association of Environmental Educators (AAEE) will hold their 15th biennial conference in Darwin in July 2008. It would be great to have some presentations from teachers and schools that are doing some great programs in environmental education, so if you are involved in sustainable schools, dust watch, energy blitz, rethinking waste or any other great initiative of your own, please think about sharing your story. There are some really innovative things happening in the Territory and it will be great to get them into the national arena. Please contact me if you would like more information.

Information will be sent out to schools early in term 1 asking for expressions of interest from 5 remote school teachers who would like to attend/present at the conference. DEET will fully fund the attendance of 5 teachers that meet the selection criteria.

Rethinking Waste in Schools

If your school hasn't registerd for this please consider it as it is a great way to muster enthusiasm amongst staff and keep the momentum going.

The Keep Australia Beautiful Website and the wikispace developed for this project will give you more information.

Wikis are a great way for students to work collaboratively to document their planning and their projects development and share with others. If you would like to know more about how you can use wikis with your class check out the Using Wikis page.

If you would like to join the rethinking waste wiki please contact louise.fogg@nt.gov.au and she will make you a member.

Some positive changes for energy in schools

DEET have recently apponted a School Sustainability Energy Smart Officer who will initially be employed for 6 months starting 2008. They will be primarily getting info out to principals and registrars re the DEET energy smart policy, working with schools who have had audits done to prioritise recommendations and will put processes in place for funding of these, hopefully through DEET minor works program.

DEET are also investigating a model so schools can keep their savings in the area of resource management - eg waste, energy

We are also looking at implementing a fantastic online monitoring program - SETS for all NT schools which graphs energy usage and is very student friendly - , it also has nice visuals equating the amount of energy used/saved with no of cars on the road, trees etc.

Plant cells, up close

The Donald Danforth Plant Science Center (USA) offers high-resolution images of plant cells for use in teaching. You can get up close and personal with a pollen grain, a chloroplast, cytoplasm and more! View all of the images on the Centre's website

Making sense of global environmental change

Do you want to stay up-to-date on the latest science and policy related to conservation and global environmental change, but just don't have the time to make sense of it all?

GreenFacts, a Belgian NGO, has put together dozens of information 'digests' on topics ranging from climate change to biodiversity. Many of their reports (in five different languages) are produced in conjunction with international bodies such as the Convention on Biological Diversity. Check out the GreenFacts website for a full list of available digests and other information

Re-Thinking Waste in Schools Workshop

Eight teachers from 5 Central Australian schools and 7 environmental experts from Alice Springs all met at the Desert Park today for the Re-Thinking Waste in Schools workshop.

The workshop was run through a wikispace which the teachers will continue to use to collaborate, share and plan both their units of work and the Big Waste Day Out celebration in August 2008. At the same time a group of Top End schools met in Darwin and were using the same wikispace to plan their own units of work and the Darwin Big Waste Day Out. To find out more and to see what the teachers are planning visit their re-thinking waste challenge wikispace


Teachers are planning all sorts of programs to create fun learning opportunities for their students that are purposeful and contextualised in the areas of reducing water, energy, litter and resource use, and increasing recycling and creative ways to deal with our waste.

If you want to join in with the Re-Thinking Waste Challenge, please contact emma.bliss@nt.gov.au (or louise.fogg@nt.gov.au if you are in the Top End)

The Re-Thinking Waste in Schools Central Australia Project is a collaborative initiative of Keep Australia Beautiful, DEET (Teaching Learning and Standard Division), NRETA (Waterwise and Alice Springs Desert Park) Gardens for Wildlife, DKA COOLmob, The Bowerbird Tip Shop and the Arid Lands Environment Centre.

Film Fundraiser for Children's Literacy Festival

The Children's Book Council of Australia are presenting

Elizabeth - The Golden Age,
a historcal thriller starring Cate Blanchett, Geoffrey Rush and Clive Owen

at The Alice Springs Cinema on Thursday 15th November at 6.30 pm.

Contact Ruth Jones 8955 0811 or 0427 524 399 for more information.

Tickets $15 available at Dymocks and Alice Springs Cinema

The Children's Literacy in the Centre (CLIC) Festival will take place in Alice Springs in May 2008

Solar Oven Bake-off

The solar oven bake-off will take place on Sunday November 18th in the Todd Mall.

The challenge is to cook a dish entirely on the day using only solar power as your heating source.

Baking begins at 11am and a panel of 3 esteemed judges will choose the winners at 4pm.

To create the winning masterpiece bring along your own solar oven, ingredients and imaginative recipies.

Entry is free for DKACOOLmob members and $5 for all other entrants.

Get your entry froms from the COOLmob website or contact Kat Taylor on 08 8952 0299

If you don't have your own solar oven yet The solar cooking archive may give you some tips on how to make your own.

Seed to Seed Food Gardens in Schools

Seed to Seed Food Gardens in Schools by Jude Fanton and Jo Immig is for teachers and parents on how to establish gardens that are biodiverse, organic and water-wise with low inputs and the full plant cycle from seed to seed. Chapters include the reasons for gardens in schools,planning, planting and maintaining, how to harvest and eat the garden and how to save seeds.

Using Google Reader to inform you of new blog posts

Are you one of those people that would like to have an email so that you know when there is new information, rather than having to check websites for updates?

If so using feed reader like Google Reader is the answer.

Google Reader is like an "inbox" for all the new content on the blogs you are interested in.

If you have the Google Toolbar you can just add an icon to the toolbar that shows immediately when there are new posts... and you can view them all from one page

It's easy to set up, just watch this video from YouTube.



If you can't view the YouTube Video, or are still not sure what to do or how this will work for you, this second video from TeacherTube gives you a bit more information.



You should now be able to set up your own Google Reader account without any trouble - but if you need assistance, ask a student!

Visualising your carbon emissions

Too young to vote but have stuff to say?

You may know some students that are too young to vote but still want to have a say about climate change and other issues relating to environment and sustainability.

Turning the Tides is a music project by Australian artists calling for action to address the grave threats posed by climate change in a manner that respects all those who share our planet. The voices of traditional Aboriginal elders are interspersed amongst songs from leading Australian artists including Missy Higgins, John Butler, Ghostwriters, Lior and more. The album features fresh material, some produced especially for the album from a range of Australia artists including Wolf and Cub, After The Fall, Good Buddha, Ben Fink, Watussi, Declan Kelly, Gelbison and more.

On the website you can learn great skills such as how to write a letter to politicians, find out information on various issues such as nuclear power aswell as the opportunity to upload your images and creative response to issues you feel passionate about onto the website.

Let the politicians know what you think real leadership means this election and what they should do about climate change.

A Youth delegation will take all Too Young To Vote messages to politicians in Canberra a week before the election.

For more info contact: TTTclimateaction@gmail.com and check out the turning the tide website at http://www.turningthetide.com.au/

Irrkerlantye exhibition of bushfoods and medicines

There is a stunning exhibition of paintings of bush food and bush medicine plants by Irrekerlantye Arts artists on at Olive Pink Botanic Garden.

The exhibition is open everyday from 10am-4pm until Sun Nov 11th.

There are many different local plants and 30 different artists represented .

Kanyini

Kanyini is a fascinating story told by Bob Randall, an indigenous man who lives beside Uluru in central Australia.

Based on his own personal journey, Bob reveals why indigenous Australians are struggling in a modern world and explains what needs to be done in order for them to advance.

A tale of indigenous wisdom clashing against materialist notions of progress, this is not only a story of one man and his people but the story of the human race

Watch or download here

Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Educational Resources

The USA Department of Energy, energy efficiency and renewable energy section have just released an updated energy education website with over 350 lesson plans covering all ages. http://www.eere.energy.gov/education/lessonplans/