Something that was fascinating to us while visiting Oz was the “School of the Air, Australia’s solution to long-distance education. Through the use of two-way radios, School of the Air teachers conduct classes each day with Australian children who are scattered far and wide across immense distances. There are several Schools of the Air around Australia including one in Alice Springs, the original home of the School. Some students live over 600 miles away.

With the help of a tutor (usually a parent), students complete their radio and written lessons and then mail their homework in to their teacher on a regular basis. So, I don't think an excuse like "The dog ate my homework" works too well in Australia, either -- although "The dingo ate my homework" might. Anyway, when they’re not on the radio, teachers grade the written work and mail it back, sometimes via RFDS planes, and at least once a year, each teacher hops into a 4-wheel drive and heads across the Outback to visit their students. In addition, all the kids come into town a few times each year to meet the other children in their radio “classroom,” which is the only time during the year that some of the kids interact with other children… or visit a town.”

So We dug out the Walkie-Talkies and had a go.

The kiddies had fun with the Australian lingo. It was amazing how much information we learned from the little picture book, Max in Australia. We made play dough marsupials, and had a kangaroo jumping contest. We also read a cute book called This is the Coral Reef and learned about The Great Barrier Reef. The kiddies made boomerangs. The only way we could get them to come back was to throw them straight up. Oh well…a lesson in gravity will work. You Tube has some cool videos of people playing the didgeridoo. We watched a painted Aboriginal man in particular make the most eerie and odd sounds.

We made our own Muesli for breakfast, DD made Damper Bread, pumpkin soup and Sunshine salad for dinner. Oh, and lots of kiwi in between.