1. We don't have marine lobsters in Australia. Our marine equivalent is crayfish. We do however have small freshwater 'lobsters' which we call yabbies. Have your students find pictures of a crayfish and a lobster. What are the main differences?

Crayfish, lobsters, yabbies and crabs all have a hard exoskeleton which is shed as they grow. The following link will take you to a page that describes the molting process of a lobster. http://www.bio.swt.edu/Lavalli/tlc/biology3.html.

2. If you have a park, racecourse or reserve near your school that has a lake or ponds, you could take your class yabbying. You will need a plastic bag of raw meat (pieces of liver a couple of days old are ideal - if they're a bit 'on the nose' all the better). Each student should bring a reel of cotton, and you will also need nets and buckets for your catch. You can make nets by forming a loop and short handle with thick wire, then sewing the open end of a pantyhose leg around the loop. Cut the leg off at a level that will give a good net and sew the bottom closed. The technique for catching yabbies is as follows:

• Tie a piece of meat to the end of a length (about 3 metres or so) of cotton.
• Hold onto the free end of the cotton and throw the end with the meat, out into the pond.
• Tie the free end of the cotton onto a stick or branch or something fixed at the edge of the pond.
• Repeat the process until each student has prepared several lines. (Make sure none of the lines are too close to any other or they will drift across each other and tangle.) If each student uses their own cotton reel of a different color, it will be easy for them to find their own lines.
• To test whether you have a yabby, walk quietly up to your line, lift it gently and test its weight. If it feel heavy, you have a yabby on the end.
• Make sure you have a net beside you and SLOWLY start pulling the yabby in. Yabbying is not like fishing - the yabby is not hooked, it is holding onto the meat with its front claws and can let go any time it likes! If it feels itself being pulled in, it will let go, so it's important to be patient and pull slowly.
• As the yabby comes within sight, grab your net. Slowly, without splashing, lower your net into the water and position it under the yabby.
• Bring your net up to catch it. You must have the net directly underneath the yabby, because if the yabby lets go of the meat, its instinct is to shoot straight downwards. If your net is approaching the yabby from the side, you will miss it, but if your net is underneath, it will shoot itself straight into the net.

At the end of the fishing session, gather around the buckets and observe your catch, discuss what you see. (The students will do this spontaneously and there will be much excitement and discussion.) If you have a fish tank in your classroom, you may wish to take a couple of specimens back to school for further observation. Otherwise, the yabbies should be tipped back into the ponds before you return to school.

Keeping Yabbies

Yabbies prefer dark places, so put leaf matter, bits of wood, rock and even plastic containers at the bottom of your aquarium for the yabbies to hide under. They eat just about anything. They are bottom feeders, so in the wild they eat the detritus that floats to the bottom of their pool. This includes leaf matter, rotting vegetation, dead pond animals etc. In an aquarium, you could feed them fish food, or drop a little bit of meat in. Don't put in too much or it will rot and poison the water.

Don't have too many yabbies together in your tank. They are both territorial and cannibalistic!

Yabbies can survive out of water for a long time as long as their gills are damp. They can and do wander long distances overland at night - in the wild this will be from pond to pond. In your classroom, this may be from aquarium to someone's desk! Therefore, make sure you put a heavy lid on your tank each day after school.

3. Have your students study some Early Readers. Discuss the format of the books. What vocabulary is used? Is it listed anywhere for easy reference by teachers? Talk about some of the strategies that are used when teaching reading - sounding out of letters, word recognition etc. Have your students create their own readers for the 5 year olds at your school, to go with whatever themes those students are currently studying. Some of your students may even wish to work through their completed books with some of the littlies.

 

| Two Hands Together & Challenge | Nips XI & Challenge & Student webpages| Away with the Birds & Challenge |
| Something's Fishy, Hazel Green! & Challenge| The Game of the Goose & Challenge | Pannikin & Pinta & Challenge |
| Home | Teacher Notes | Book Quest Notes | Web Quest Explanation | Sign Up | Start Quest |