Hello teachers!

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This week, we’re marking World Philosophy Day with resources for deep thinking and respectful disagreement. We’re revisiting Türkiye on Squiz the World while COP31 is underway, and we’ve got the Bug Count if you’re keen to get your class outdoors. Then it’s over to Adelaide Zoo to meet a tiny golden gibbon.

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Or, a room full of primary school kids asking whether it’s fair to give everyone the same amount of help when some people need more?

World Philosophy Day is this Thursday, 19 November. A philosophical inquiry gives kids time to think past their first answer, explain their reasons, listen closely and practise disagreeing respectfully. They might even change their minds.

For Years 5 or 6, one that’s worked well for me is a Marvel dilemma. Thanos thinks wiping out half the universe’s population will leave enough resources for everyone else. If everyone has the same chance of being snapped away, does that make his plan fair? The best bit is hearing kids build on each other’s thinking. Try giving them these two starts: ‘I see it differently because …’ and ‘Something you said made me rethink …’

Other ready-to-use resources for you

If you said Istanbul, you’re in good company. Istanbul gets plenty of attention, what with its ancient chariot-racing track and its school commute that can take you from one continent to another. But the capital is Ankara. See if your class can find both cities on a map, then look for Antalya, where COP31 is underway this week.

This Tuesday on Squiz the World we’re revisiting Türkiye. From the legend of the Trojan Horse to the Turkish dinner table, where there’s gözleme, baklava and mantı on the menu. We’d book a seat just for dinner.

Send your students on a ten-minute schoolyard safari. Look for beetles, snails and other tiny neighbours, then snap a photo of what they find.

Teachers, you can upload the class’s sightings to iNaturalist to help build a springtime snapshot of Australia’s bugs. Those photos can also help experts spot invasive species early, before they spread and cause more harm to native wildlife. And if your sleuths can only narrow their find down to “some sort of beetle”, that’s a perfectly good start.

Join Bugs in My Backyard Week · Free classroom resources

Some families start the day with an alarm clock. At Adelaide Zoo, gibbons Viet and Remus start theirs with a duet of whoops and hoots. And now there’s a tiny new audience member clinging to Mum.

The zoo announced on Thursday that it had welcomed its first critically endangered white-cheeked gibbon in a decade. The baby arrived with golden fur, which will gradually turn black as it grows.

If your class would like to have a go at the duet, I’ll leave the volume settings to you.

Here’s what’s happening around the country and the world:

Geography Awareness Week

National Skin Cancer Action Week (15–22 Nov). Sid Seagull turns 45 

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Thursday

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