HASS · Year 5

Active learning ideas

The Life and Times of Ned Kelly

This topic lends itself to active learning because students need to feel the isolation and physical demands of life in the bush. Hands-on activities help them move beyond textbook descriptions and connect emotionally with the daily realities faced by squatters and selectors.

• ACARA Content Descriptions
• AC9HASS5K01

• 30–60 min
• Pairs → Whole Class
• 3 activities

Activity 01

• Stations Rotation
• 60 min · Small Groups

Stations Rotation: Bush Survival Skills

Stations include 'The Slab Hut' (building techniques), 'The Bush Doctor' (natural remedies), and 'The Campfire' (cooking with rations). Students learn about the ingenuity required to survive without modern shops or services.

Explain the social and economic context of Ned Kelly's upbringing.

Facilitation Tip

During Station Rotation: Bush Survival Skills, set a strict 6-minute timer per station to mirror the relentless pace of bush work and prevent over-explaining.

What to look for

Pose the question: 'Based on what we've learned about life for selectors, why might a young person like Ned Kelly have developed a distrust of the authorities?' Encourage students to cite specific examples of economic hardship or legal conflicts discussed in class.

• Remember
• Understand
• Apply
• Analyze
• Self-Management
• Relationship Skills

Activity 02

• Simulation Game
• 45 min · Whole Class

Simulation Game: Squatters vs. Selectors

The classroom is divided into large 'runs' owned by squatters. 'Selector' students must try to claim small blocks of land within those runs, leading to a simulation of the legal and social conflicts that occurred in the 1860s.

Analyze the events that led to Ned Kelly's first encounters with the law.

What to look for

Provide students with a short timeline of key events in Ned Kelly's early life (e.g., birth, father's death, mother's arrest). Ask them to draw a line connecting each event to a potential consequence or influence on his later life, explaining their reasoning in one sentence.

• Apply
• Analyze
• Evaluate
• Create
• Social Awareness
• Decision-Making

Activity 03

• Think-Pair-Share
• 30 min · Pairs

Think-Pair-Share: A Letter Home

Students imagine they are a child living in a remote bush hut. They discuss with a partner three things they miss from the city and three things they have learned to do in the bush, then draft a short letter to a cousin.

Predict how Kelly's early experiences might have shaped his later actions.

What to look for

Ask students to write down two specific challenges faced by the Kelly family or other selectors in the 1860s and 1870s. Then, have them write one sentence predicting how these challenges might have contributed to Ned Kelly's decision to become an outlaw.

• Understand
• Apply
• Analyze
• Self-Awareness
• Relationship Skills

A few notes on teaching this unit

Teachers should use role-play and primary sources to humanize historical figures rather than glorify them. Avoid romanticizing Ned Kelly’s outlaw status, and instead focus on the systemic pressures that led to conflict. Research shows students retain more when they analyze diary entries alongside policy documents to see cause and effect.

Successful learning looks like students describing specific challenges of bush life with evidence from simulations and primary sources. They should articulate how these challenges shaped decisions and behaviors, not just list facts about Ned Kelly.

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Watch Out for These Misconceptions

• During Station Rotation: Bush Survival Skills, watch for students assuming life in the bush was thrilling or glamorous.

  Use the station materials, such as replica tools and diary excerpts, to redirect students’ focus to the repetitive, exhausting nature of daily labor.

• During Simulation: Squatters vs. Selectors, watch for students believing the bush was an empty, ownerless land.

  Have students refer to the land-use maps and First Nations oral histories provided to highlight dispossession and contested ownership.

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Methods used in this brief

• Stations Rotation
• Simulation Game
• Think-Pair-Share