Poems

Australia, such a nice country.
There are lots of animals over there.
I also have my favourite.
That is the traditional animal, the kangaroo.
Them I like the most.
The platypus is also very lovely.

10 minute poem from Noortje

Poems

It lies southeastern,

Beautiful  Australia

a land of great plains.

- Haiku from Merel

Poems

I’m a big island.

With a hot sun and a beach.

I’m Australia.

made by Ronald

Poems.

Australian boy.
you run like a kangaroo!
Don't stop running boy.

Haiku by Denny Brom

Platypus.

Introduction,
The latin name of the platypus is Ornithorhynchus anatinus. The platypus a is unique Australian mammal. They have features of multiple other mammals, the beak of a duck the body of a mole and the tail of a beaver. The platypus is an monotrem mammal this means that they only have one hole which they do everything with for example: mate, lay eggs and secrete. Monotrems naturally only occur in Australia.

History,
 The platypus is called a living fossil due to the fact that the animal has not evolved in the last 15 million years. The platypus was discovered back in 1799 by the British scientist Dr. George Shaw. His first thought was that it was a joke this could not be a living mammal. He thought that the beak was sewed onto the body, he tried to release the stabbing with a pair of scissors. He called it Platypus anatinus which means ‘’flat foot duck-like’’  a group of beetles already had the name platypus. Because of this we gave the platypus the official name Ornithorhynchus anatinus which means ‘’bird-like snout’’. Nowadays we call them platypus again and everyone accepted that. The aboriginals thought that the platypus came from a female duck who mated with a lonely rat. This explains where the flat feet end the snout comes from, from the duck. And the beautiful brown skin comes from the rat.

Noortje Roosendaal

Music

Topic: music

My second article was about music. I’ve looked on the internet at music festivals in Australia. There are very much festivals in Australia, but the funny thing was that I could find Dutch festival in Australia. This festival is called Defqon 1. Australia. I’m going to say something about this festival.

Defqon 1. is a summer festival organized by Q-dance. In the Netherlands is it one of the biggest festivals. The cards of this year were sold out within a few minutes. But this great festival is now held in Sidney Australia. It is the third time. This festival is all by different DJs playing a certain type of music, namely hardstyle. Hardstyle is a little hardcore match. But hardstyle is usually more melody and the beat goes slower. The music is all at different stages played by the most famous hardstyle DJs. In  the evening the party breaks really loose with spectacular fireworks.
This festival seems really nice. In movies you can see that it really is a big event. When I am old enough, I would certainly go one time and it would be totally awesome if I can do this in Australia.

By Ronald Postma

Tourist information.

Australia has a lot to offer to tourists, it has sights, amusement parks, great nature and lots of cities and towns. Australia is very popular among tourists and that isn’t just great for the tourists but also for Australia itself! Australia makes a lot of money out of tourism, but a lot of it flows back into tourist sector because Australia also invests in cultural events and the protection of nature.

Australia’s first inhabitants were the aboriginals. Some are still alive and some of them also give tours and excursions. On tours like these you live with the aboriginals for a whole day and learn a lot about them. There’s also the city’s to visit. You’ve got Sydney, great for shopping and the Sydney Opera House is really worth a visit. You can also shop really well there, the same thing counts for Melbourne, there’s really a lot of nice shops to visit. If you’re into sports then you should really go to the shore of Australia. Australia has a few of the best surfing beaches in the whole world. Last but not least there’s the nature. There’s lots of animals to see and great sights to explore all over the country. There’s uluru and the king canyons and much more of where that came from.

So if you’re going to Australia you can do whatever you want because Australia has a little bit of everything.

Hilo48. "Australia" Wikipedia

13:33, 4 November 2001. 13 April 2011

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia>

 "Australia Adventure Guide: The Gold Coast's Surfing, Hiking, and Creeping "Fellas"" Nation Geographic

 April 2011. dinsdag 26 april 2011
 13

<http://ngadventure.typepad.com/blog/2011/03/adventure-trip-report-queensland-australia.html>

By Denny Brom

Fashion and trends: what’s hot and what’s not.

Modern Australia has a unique fashion style that is able to be clearly distinguished from European fashion lines. Whereas European fashion has a more tailored approach, Australian fashion has a more casual approach.

Although Australia doesn't have a traditional way of dressing but an Australian national dress style, based on specific local dress styles, has emerged in response to climate, lifestyle and identity.  Due to the mild weather, Australians tend to wear light clothing. In the workplace, people dress to stay cool which consists of long socks and tailored shorts instead of slacks. People dress stylishly in the city and in the workplace, but tend to dress down in jeans and sneakers for the weekends. Children must wear uniforms at school and sunscreen all year round. Having a tan is a sign of a fool because Australia has the highest rate of skin cancer in the world.

The fashion in Australia stands out by its nature that is been fashioned or created. Many of Australia's top designers have been inspired by an extraordinary range of Australian fashion textiles and cultural influences. On its turn, Australian creations are in global demand.

 The designer Easton Pearson, uses a lot of tropical and cultural prints. 

http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-story/modern-austn-fashion
http://fits.depauw.edu/mkfinney/culturaleresumes/australia/trads.htm

Merel Water H4b

Education in Australia.

This are your years you have to follow and the age category’s for every year.
The education program and everything is arranged by departments, these are the following departments: Department of Education, Employment and Training (DEET) (1987) Department of Employment, Education, Training and Youth Affairs (DEETYA) (1996) Department of Education, Training and Youth Affairs (DETYA) (1997) Department of Education, Science and Training (DEST) (2001) Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations (DEEWR) (2007) .

Primary

• Kindergarten (QLD) 3-4 year old)
• Pre-school / Kindergarten / Prep (ACT, NT, NSW and SA/ TAS, VIC and WA / QLD): 4-5 year olds
• Kindergarten / Preparatory / Pre-Primary / Reception / Transition(ACT and NSW / TAS, VIC and QLD / WA / SA / NT): 5-6 year old
• Year 1: 6-7 year olds
• Year 2: 7-8 year olds
• Year 3: 8-9 year olds
• Year 4: 9-10 year olds
• Year 5: 10-11 year olds
• Year 6: 11-12 year olds
• Year 7: 12-13 year olds (QLD, SA, WA)

Secondary

• Year 7: 12-13 year olds (ACT, NSW, TAS, VIC)(Middle School NT)
• Year 8: 13-14 year olds
• Year 9: 14-15 year olds
• Year 10: 15-16 year olds (High School NT)
• Year 11: 16-17 year olds ("College" ACT)
• Year 12: 17-19 year olds
  

At private schoolsMost Australian schools are co-educational - for boys and girls. Some Catholic and Independent schools are single-gender, mainly at Secondary level, but sometimes in the Primary years as well. Some Independent single-gender schools offer co-educational classes in the early years. Nearly all Government schools are co-educational. There are a few single-gender Government Secondary schools in some States in Australia.



Noortje Roosendaal

Religion: which religions can be found in this country? What’s the main religion?

The Australian Constitution guarantees full freedom of religion. So there is are a variety of religions that can be found there, but Australia is still considered as a Christian country. But the fast growing religions are Buddhism and Islam. More than one million people in Australia have no religion. The Original inhabitants of Australia had their own religion.

About 75% of the people in Australia are Christian. One of the most visible signs of the historical importance of Christianity to Australia is the prominence of churches in most Australian towns and cities. Churches in Australia with the largest number of members are the Roman Catholic Church, the Anglican Church and the Uniting Church.

The original inhabitants of Australia are the Aborigines. The Aboriginals of Australia has a large number of tribal divisions and language groups and  a wide variety of diversity is within cultural practices. There are some similarities between the cultures however. Indigenous Australians' oral tradition and spiritual values are based upon reverence for the land and a belief in this Dreamtime. The Dreaming is at once both the ancient time of creation and the present day reality of Dreaming. There were a great many different groups, each with their own individual culture, belief structure and language. Dreaming is the key aspect of the Aborgines.

The Australian Constitution guarantees full freedom of religion. That’s something that really stands out because there is a diversity of religions.

Merel Water

Photo: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_Australia

Articel:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_Australia 

This page was last modified on 22 April 2011 at 03:25.



kangaroos

I have chosen animals as my First subject. It's a lot of work to write about all the animals that live in Australia. That is why I chose a species. I chose the kangaroo because when I think about Australia I immediately think about the kangaroo.

Kangaroos are mammals and the come from Australia and New Guinea. They descend from the family of marsupials. Kangaroos have large hind legs, they can jump very high with their legs. They also have a muscular tail that keeps them in balance while jumping. The female kangaroos have a pouch that is open on the top. They can put a child in it. A few fun facts about these kangaroos are: The kangaroo can't walk backwards, they are vegetarians and the females are almost continuously pregnant. You have many kinds of kangaroos. These are the most known kangaroos: The giant kangaroo, the tree kangaroo and the wallaby. 

The kangaroos just are nice animals. They almost never cause any harm to anyone. Hopefully they won’t extinction from the earth. And I'm sure if you go to Australia that you'll encounter a lot of kangaroos.

Made by Ronald.

The Australian economic situation.

What do we really know about the Australian economic situation, Australia gets a lot of attention in the media. But usually it’s about their nature or the cultural side of Australia. But the country can’t buy food from doing cultural activities, you need money for that, you need finance!

Because Australia is only civilized for a short period of time there still is are a lot of resources left there. A lot of those resources still have to be found and mined, that costs money and Australia can’t just make money out of nothing. They need people to invest in Australia because if companies from other countries just mine it Australia can’t make a good profit out of it.

Another important part of the economics of Australia is the stock exchange. Although definitely not the biggest, the ASX really does contribute to the world economics. And as you can see in the graph the stocks are going rather well, a growth of 20% percent is predicted for the next 3 years so investing now is a good choice.

So as you can imagine Australia has a growing and promising economy. All it needs is some good investors and Australia can really grow big!

13:33, 4 November 2001. 13 April 2011
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia>

 "indices" AFR

 April 2011. 13 April 2011
 13

<http://afr.com/business>

Note:this really isn't an article but the indices of the asx is shown here.

By Denny Brom.

Hilo48. "Australia" Wikipedia

Interview Merel Water.

Merel is a sixteen year old girl she lives in the Netherlands. She chose this country because it is an English  speaking country and it is very interesting. She finds it interesting because of the former residents, the landscape and the animals, all that is so different from Holland. Of all the animals she likes the kangaroo’s, koala’s and the platypus the most. She would really like to go there someday because she is curious how it feels to live there.

 Interview by Noortje

Interview Denny Brom.

Denny, the boy I interviewed is 15 years old and lives in the Netherlands. His English is somewhat better than mine but just like me he doesn’t know that much about Australia. He likes Australia for its nature but he doesn’t like the food very much. I asked him if he would come with his parents if they would immigrate to Australia and he answered yes, not just because he wants to come with his parents but also because he thinks Australia is a beautiful country. According to him the main difference between the Netherlands and Australia is the nature and the weather. Those both are very important to him.

Interview by Ronald.

Interview Ronald Postma.

I interviewed Ronald, a 15 year old boy that lives in the Netherlands. Ronald is also going to write two articles with us, but it's going to be extra hard for him because he doesn't speak English very well. He hopes this is a way to learn more about it. Ronald already knows all the basic stuff, but that’s just for tourists. He wants to actually learn something about it. When Merel came up with writing about Australia I thought Ronald wouldn’t agree with it but then he did anyway! Ronald is really open to new stuff in his life and always wants to learn. He would even like to live in Australia for a few years

Interview by Denny.

Interview Noortje Roosendaal.

Noortje is a girl of seventeen years old,she’s born in the Netherlands. Although Noortje doesn’t know anyone who has ever been to Australia, she would really like to visit the country some day. She would even like to follow a study about animals there. Because animals are the first thing that pops in her mind when Noortje thinks about Australia, the animals make the country so interesting to her.

Interview by Merel.

What is this blog about?

We're going to create a blog, a blog about australia. We're busy writing our first drafts at the moment and we will publish them as soon as were ready. Offcourse since we're dutch stundents our english is far from perfect. Therefore we always need to check and correct everything we write.