Educational resources for National Symbols and Commonwealth Coat of Arms

SOSE / HSIE / The Humanities / Society & History

National Symbols

  • Hold an Australian National Flag raising ceremony at your school. What format will you and your students follow? Sing the Australian National Anthem. Perhaps encourage students to read aloud some poems they have written about Australia.
  • Students to form groups, each focusing on the colours and designs used in the Australian National Flag, Australian Aboriginal Flag and Torres Strait Islander Flag. Students to report to the class on what the colours and designs represent in each of the flags.
  • Students to research what NAIDOC stands for. Perhaps hold a NAIDOC Week celebration.
  • Students to select a few lines of Australia’s National Anthem and write in their own words what they think they mean. Students to share their ideas with others in the class. Then, as a class, discuss the actual meaning of the Australian National Anthem.
  • As a class, begin a highly visual timeline of events surrounding the National Symbols and the Commonwealth Coat of Arms. Students could add to this list as they discover more facts. Students to also complete their own ‘Timeline of Events’ activity sheet.
    National Symbols - Timeline of events - PDF 50KB | RTF 64KB
  • Students to investigate Australia’s national gemstone, the opal, including the location of Australia’s most significant opal mines. Perhaps have students present their findings on a poster for display in the classroom.
  • Students to list the official national symbols of Australia. What is significant about each of the symbols?  Students to complete the ‘National Symbols of Australia’ activity sheet.
    National Symbols of Australia   PDF 8KB | RTF 51KB

Commonwealth Coat of Arms

  • Students to complete the ‘Commonwealth Coat of Arms’ activity sheet.
    Commonwealth Coat of Arms   PDF 53KB | RTF 51KB
  • Students to complete the ‘Timeline of Events’ activity sheet.
    Commonwealth Coat of Arms - Timeline of events - PDF 50KB | RTF 64KB
  • Students to investigate how each of the Australian states is represented on the Commonwealth Coat of Arms.
  • Students to investigate the use of the Commonwealth Coat of Arms on our 50 cent coin.  What is the name given to the shape of the coin? Who designed the coin? What other interesting facts can students find out about Australia’s 50 cent coin?

English / English Language / English - History

National Symbols

  • Students to complete the ‘National Symbols’ KWL Chart
    National Symbols KWL Chart - PDF 6KB | RTF 44KB
  • Students to write a poem inspired by the symbols of Australia’s identity and unity.
  • Students to research and then write an ‘Information Report’ on the official times of the year when the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags are flown. The report is to include the significance of the 1967 referendum.
  • Students to write an ‘Explanation Text’ on the significant features of the Australian National Flag, including the Union Jack, the Commonwealth Star and the Southern Cross.

Commonwealth Coat of Arms

  • Students to complete the ‘Commonwealth Coat of Arms’ KWL Chart.
    Commonwealth Coat of Arms KWL Chart - PDF 6KB | RTF 44KB
  • Students to prepare a ‘Factual Speech’ on the Commonwealth Coat of Arms.
  • Students to write a letter to someone who has never seen the animals that appear on the Commonwealth Coat of Arms, describing some of their unique features.
  • Students to investigate when and where the Commonwealth Coat of Arms is used.  Students to discuss where they have seen the Commonwealth Coat of Arms e.g. buildings, Australian 50 cent coins, Australian passports, Australian citizenship certificates.  Students to bring in items from home that incorporate the Commonwealth Coat of Arms and prepare a ‘talk’ about their item for the class.

The Arts / Creative Arts

National Symbols

  • Students to complete the ‘Design Your Own National Symbols Stamp’ activity sheet.
    Design your own National Symbols stamp - PDF 5KB | RTF 41KB
  • Students to create a green and gold mural in the classroom or school that helps to show why green and gold are Australia’s national colours.
  • Students to study the features of an Australian opal e.g. colours, tones. Using oil pastels, students to create a painting of an opal.
  • Using Golden Wattle and/or other native Australian plants, students to design the front of a postcard titled, ‘Australia’s Beautiful Flora’.
  • Students to select one line from the Australian National Anthem and create a picture illustrating what their thoughts are when they read it. Students to label their pictures and share their thoughts with the class.
  • Students to take a close look at the Commonwealth Star and create a realistic 3D version of it.
  • Students to listen to the Australian National Anthem.  In small groups they create silent movements to the lyrics and then perform these movements for the class.

Commonwealth Coat of Arms

  • Students to investigate Golden Wattle and other Australian native plants and collect pictures to create a collage for display in the classroom.
  • Students to create ‘rubbings’ of 50 cent coins.  They place the coin, with the Commonwealth Coat of Arms facing upwards, under a piece of paper.  Students then carefully shade over it with a lead pencil.

Science / Design & Technology

National Symbols

  • Students to examine a piece of Golden Wattle (or a good technical representation of it) and re-create it in their Science books.  Students to then label the different parts of the flower.
  • Students to investigate the ‘pulley’ simple machine commonly used to hoist the Australian National Flag up a flag pole. What is the key feature of a pulley that makes it useful?
  • Students to use PowerPoint to create a presentation showing phrases and pictures that depict each of the national symbols of Australia and the main points of interest surrounding them.
  • Students to investigate the Southern Cross.  What is its scientific name? Where and when is it used? Students to also research other constellations that can be seen in the Australian sky.

Commonwealth Coat of Arms

  • Students to complete a two-minute presentation on the kangaroo or emu. Their presentation is to include topics such as behaviour, diet and other unique features of the animals.

Mathematics / Mathematics - Numeracy

National Symbols

  • Students to design a survey designed to discover other students’ favourite national symbol. Create tables of the results and calculate percentages of the responses. Analyse the results and discuss them as a class. What were the common responses? Discuss why you think these were so.
  • Students to create a flow chart of events surrounding the development of the Australian National Flag and the Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags. In which years did these events occur? Calculate the number of years in between each event and brainstorm the reasons for this.

Commonwealth Coat of Arms

  • Students to investigate roman numerals and then discover which king (King Edward VII or King George V) made the first official grant of the Coat of Arms to the Commonwealth of Australia. Students to discover three interesting facts about the King and his reign.

Languages / LOTE / English - Literacy

National Symbols

  • Students to compare and contrast the colours and symbols that appear on a number of other countries’ flags. Investigate to discover and then discuss the significance of the symbols on the flags of other nations with whom Australia has diplomatic relations.
  • Students to compare and contrast one verse of the Australian National Anthem with anthems from one or two other countries such as the United States of America, New Zealand, Great Britain or Indonesia. Discuss the findings.
  • Students to discover how to write and pronounce the words ‘anthem’ or ‘symbol’ in five languages other than English.

Health & Physical Education / Personal Development / Health & Wellbeing

National Symbols

  • Students to investigate how green and gold became the national sporting colours of Australia.
  • Hold a Green and Gold Mini-Olympics.

Commonwealth Coat of Arms

  • Australian athletes competing in the Commonwealth Games or Olympic Games wear uniforms featuring the Commonwealth Coat of Arms.  Students to discuss why it is important that the Commonwealth Coat of Arms is featured on the uniforms of athletes representing our country. Students to investigate the different items of clothing that combine to form the official uniform.