St Helena Stories is a day program that uses story as a medium for engaging students in historical events and places. The program, conducted on St Helena Island National Park, departs from and returns to Manly.
Prior to the program, students are introduced to a biography of three authentic prisoners. They use these historic sources to explore what life was like for different people during the colonial period. These stories come to life on the island, as students are immersed in a theatre-in-education experience, allowing an understanding of society and points of view in the past to be developed.
On St Helena Island, students actively engage in making observations, investigating heritage structures and interpreting sources for evidence of the past. Students sequence changes from Indigenous use of the land to prison settlement, viewing the ways people managed this place and how human actions influenced this environment. They interrogate societal attitudes and how this influenced the lives of the men incarcerated in the prison.
The prisoner stories serve as a powerful stimulus for students to write a personal account or biography of a settler or prisoner.
Curriculum Intent
Humanities and Social Sciences
Inquiry and Skills
Researching
Locate and collect relevant information and data from primary sources and secondary sources (ACHASSI095)
Organise and represent data in a range of formats including tables, graphs and large and small scale maps, using discipline-appropriate conventions (ACHASSI096)
- Sequence information about people’s lives, events, developments and phenomena using a variety of methods including timelines (ACHASSI097)
Analysing
Evaluating and Reflecting
Knowledge and Understanding
History
Reasons (economic, political and social) for the establishment of British colonies in Australia after 1800 (ACHASSK106)
The nature of convict or colonial presence, including the factors that influenced patterns of development, aspects of the inhabitants (including Aboriginal Peoples and Torres Strait Islander Peoples) and how the environment changed (ACHASSK107)
- The role that a significant individual or group played in shaping a colony (ACHASSK110)
Geography
- The environmental and human influences on the location and characteristics of a place and the management of spaces within them (ACHASSK113)
General Capabilities
Critical and creative thinking
- Inquiring-identifying, exploring and organising information and ideas
Personal and social capability
Ethical understanding
- Understanding ethical concepts and issues
Literacy
- Comprehending texts through listening, reading and viewing
Cross-curriculum Priorities
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities maintain a special connection to and responsibility for Country/Place throughout all of Australia
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples have lived in Australia for tens of thousands of years and experiences can be viewed through historical, social and political lenses
C2C
HASS Unit 3 ‘Communities in Colonial Australia (1800’s)’