The Other Side

1. Ask your students to imagine that they are the television reporter sent to cover the confrontation between the Eagles and the developer. They should write up the report that they will present on the television news. They may wish to include quotes from interviews with Gramps and the developer.
2. Discuss the qualities of dreaming stories with your students, highlighting their effectiveness as a way of passing knowledge from one generation to the next, and the use of animals in these stories. Invite students to select an environmental message that they think is important, and to create a dreaming story that conveys this message.
3. Provide each student with a copy of the Something familiar? BLM (PDF file 423kb). This worksheet challenges students to see similarities between members of the Eagles and the native animals Alex meets in his dream.
4. What are the environmental concerns shared by people in your neighbourhood? Ask students to work in small groups and conduct research to identify any groups that are working to solve problems relating to the environment in your community. What are their problems and concerns? What tactics are they using to highlight their concerns? Has there been any press coverage of these issues? Have they had any success? Groups should present their findings as a short written report.
5. The Other Side is inspired by the rabbit-proof fence, which was an attempt to contain the spread of an introduced species. Use the Introduced species BLM (PDF file 346kb) to guide student research into other species that have been introduced into Australia. Give each small group of students one of the pieces of the jigsaw and ask them to include maps and images when they report on their research.

> Play true or false game about introduced and native species
> Explore The Other Side discussion questions
> Purchase book