Australia and Oceania

Unit Review Sheet

Facts and Definitions

Lesson 1: The Rainbow Serpent

• Aboriginal Australians have lived in Australia for over 60,000 years.
• The culture of the Australian Aborigines is thought to be the oldest continuing culture on our planet.
• Aboriginal Australians believe that the world and its inhabitants were created in the Dreamtime, and the many stories of this distant past are important in Aboriginal Australian culture.

Lesson 2: Overview of Australia and Oceania

• Aboriginal Australians arrived in Australia over 50,000 years ago. The Pacific islands where inhabited about 7000 years ago, and New Zealand's first people arrived a little more than 1000 years ago.
• Oceania includes three major groups of the Pacific Islands.

Lesson 3: Australia and Papua New Guinea

• Australia was settled by Great Britain in the 1770s and became an independent commonwealth in 1901.
• The arrival of Europeans created many problems for the indigenous people of Australia. Today, the Australian government has established a number of programs to assist Aboriginal Australians.
• There are many similarities between the governments of the United States and Australia but important differences as well.

Lesson 4: Stories of the Yorta-Yorta People

• Australia is home to many animals that are found nowhere else on Earth.
• Uluru is a sacred place for Aboriginal Australians.

Lesson 5: New Zealand

• The climates of the North Island and South Island of New Zealand are quite different.
• New Zealand was one of the last places on Earth to be settled by human beings. The Maori arrived in New Zealand around 950 AD.
• New Zealand was the first country in the world to grant women the right to vote.

Lesson 6: Peoples of the Pacific Ocean

• About 20,000 islands are in the Pacific Ocean.
• Many Pacific Islanders follow traditional ways of life, growing crops, fishing, and living in villages with large extended families.
• Many Pacific islands are popular tourist destinations.

Lesson 7: Polar Regions

• The Arctic Ocean and Antarctica are the coldest places on Earth. Because the regions are so inhospitable, few people live in the Arctic region, and there are no permanent residents of Antarctica at all.
• Most of the Arctic Ocean is covered by ice. The land of Antarctica is also covered by an ice cap.

Final Project: Celebrating Australia and Oceania

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