Teaching visual literacy is everyone's responsibility! This poster was designed as part of a cross-curriculum promotional campaign to teach staff in all faculties in a New England NSW high school about visual literacy being a component of literacy in every area of the curriculum and also to provide students with an example of how a visual image can be deconstructed to find the hidden messages. This poster is an example of how the techniques of visual literacy can be used in Agricultural Technology classes. It applies an excellent template developed by the English Teacher's Association of NSW to a popular Australian magazine on rural life.

Unit of work on Farm Tools and Machinery. Designed for students of the NSW 7-10 Agricultural Technology Syllabus. Cross-content unit of work that includes interactions, management, sustainability, technology. It includes: + Quad bikes + Firearms in agriculture Tillage equipment + Farm safety + Identify the agricultural machinery Information report assessment task Farm tools and machinery findaword 3 Cloze activities: Combine harvesters, Machinery in the cotton industry, aircraft in agriculture Ezine article: Farming advances with appliance of science to tractor technology Ezine article: Death of 3 Canadian Girls Ezine article: New high-tech farm equipment is a nightmare for farmers Ezine article: Drone weeds out good from bad Research: Tractors Metalanguage Magazine article: Front-end loaders can exceed tractor limits Video and worksheet: The Future Farming Technology Video and worksheet: Outback helicopter mustering Video and worksheet: RIPPA: The farm robot exterminates pests and weeds

This resource has been developed for the NSW 7-10 Agricultural Technology syllabus, unit on Farm Tools and Machinery. It has been used with both a regular mixed-ability class and a class for students with Emotional Disorders (ED). The activities within the resource can be adapted for Gifted and Talented and classes for students with Intellectual Disabilities (IM/IO). The resource focuses on how quad bikes are used on Australian properties, safety issues and recreational use. There are both literacy and numeracy activities. Some activities require internet access. Other activities can be completed using only the information on the pages. This makes the activities ideal for students to use on school farms/agricultural plots after practical work has been completed.

This resource has been developed to support student understanding of the NSW 7-10 Agricultural Technology syllabus. It requires students to identify various common pieces of technology found on Australian properties and to use the internet to research how they are used. The activity has been used with both a regular mixed-ability class and a class for students with an Emotional Disorder (ED). It can be adapted for use with other specialised classes.

This poster was part of a series made for a New England NSW high school to promote the importance of visual literacy across the curriculum and to scaffold how a visual image (in this case an advertisement) can be used to elicit short- and long-responses from students. The techniques of visual literacy are outlined in the diagram on the second page.

This worksheet requires students to use the internet to find investigate some of the dangers of using common equipment on Australian farms and to make decisions on how the equipment should be handled safely. I use it as part of the NSW Stage 5 Agricultural Technology course, topic on Farm Tools and Machinery. The focus is on farm management, safety and sustainability.

Worksheet and answers to accompany the 6-minute documentary by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Catalyst program, RIPPA: The farm robot exterminates pests and weeds. The documentary examines a solar-powered, self-propelled robot that scans agricultural plants for pests and weeds and either removes the weed or selectively spot-sprays particular plants. The resource is designed for Stage 4/5 students of the NSW Agricultural Technology Syllabus for the Australian Curriculum.

Worksheet to accompany Australian Broadcasting Corporation Landline series mini-documentary, Outback helicopter mustering. The 5-minute documentary examines the technology and sustainability in the mustering and export of feral water buffalo in Arnhem Land. Answers are included. This resource is part of a unit of work, Farm Tools and Machinery for the Stages 4/5 NSW Agricultural Technology Syllabus for the Australian Curriculum.