Year 4 Level Description

How people, places and environments interact, past and present

The Year 4 curriculum focuses on interactions between people, places and environments over time and space and the effects of these interactions. Students gain opportunities to expand their world knowledge and learn about the significance of environments, examining how people’s need and want of resources over time has affected peoples, societies and environments. Specifically, students study European exploration and colonisation in Australia and elsewhere up to the early 1800s and life for Indigenous Australians pre- and post-contact. They examine the concept of sustainability, and its application to resource use and waste management, past and present, by different groups. The curriculum introduces the role of local government, laws and rules, and group belonging and how they meet people’s needs. 

Inquiry Questions

• How have laws affected the lives of people, past and present?
• What were the short- and long-term effects of European settlement on the local environment and Indigenous land and water management practices?
• What is the significance of the environment and what are different views on how it can be used and sustained, past and present?

(Australian Curriculum)

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Learning Areas

Civics and Citizenship

Geography

Cross Curriculum Priorities