Colonial+Life

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Cobb & Co coaches for transport and mail

Women in colonial times

Film clips from documentary series The Colony 2005, in which white families and urban Aboriginal families are trying to survive in conditions facing the early settlers and indigenous people of the time.


 * PF PAT – Paterson, A. B. “The Man From Snowy River”; “Waltzing Matilda”,; “The Man From Ironbark”; “Mulga Bill’s Bicycle”; “Clancy of the Overflow”; “Bush Christening”. These are picture-book publications showing Australian life in the nineteenth century.
 * BF BAK – Baker, Jeannie, “The Story of Rosie Dock”; “Window”. Both these wordless picture books show how the Australian landscape has changed over time as a result of settlement.

Ringwood, Vic. : Puffin Books, 196 pages 1980. A discontented Sydney teenager travels back in time to 1873, whilst watching an old fashioned children's game. The nineteenth-century characters that become part of her life live around The Rocks in Sydney, and Abigail's experiences with them give an impression life at The Rocks in the latter part of the nineteenth century. Abigail has brief experiences of very early Sydney settlement as well. The book was made into a film, available on DVD. || || New York : Clarion Books, 2005. When Papa takes the sandalwood he has cut into town, it is fifty miles along sand tracks by horse and cart, and he will be away a long time. Then Lizzie and Mama and baby are all alone in the little house in the bush. Lizzie is always playing and pretending. She is always dreaming. "Lizzie nonsense!" her mama calls it. Lizzie Nonsense brings to life, through the story of one family, the experience of pioneering women and children left alone in the Australian bush while their husbands and fathers were away working. || || Please click here to return to Year 5 Topics
 * Playing Beatie Bow / Ruth Park.
 * Lizzie nonsense / Jan Ormerod.