Dairy farming and climate change – a context for learning

Farming is a way of life in New Zealand. Farms cover about half of the country’s land and are important to our economy. Agriculture has shaped who we are as a nation, but it has also had a big impact on the country’s natural landscape and environment.

Teaching in a dairy sector context

Agricultural science and the primary production sector provide rich contexts for students to develop practical, problem-solving, sustainable and future-focused approaches to learning. Students’ purposeful learning in the dairy sector involves a wide range of practical experiences with a diverse curriculum including economic, historical, social and cultural influences on primary production and the interrelationships of science, technology, society and the environment.

Curriculum links

The resources featured connect with both the agriculture and horticulture curriculum as well as Living World and Planet Earth and Beyond concepts. This context also provides an opportunity to explore te ao Māori concepts.

Agriculture and horticulture concepts

• Primary producers produce for a market
  Primary products are those that leave the farm gate. Milk, meat and potatoes are primary products. Cheese, milk powder and chips are not. Primary producers will gather and use feedback from consumers to manage production and on-farm processes to meet the requirements of consumers. Primary production focuses on the processes involved in growing the products.
• Producers systematically manage life processes
  Primary producers work with live animals, plants and microorganisms. They manage the life processes of the live organisms in their care to ensure a marketable product is produced.
• Production systems must be sustainable
  The production of primary products must be sustainable. The impacts on the environment must be minimised to ensure viability and add value to New Zealand’s reputation as clean and green. Sustainable management practices ensure production of primary products meets consumers requirements without compromising the ability of future generations to do the same. Preventing, limiting, minimising or correcting environmental damage to water, air and soil as well as considering the interrelatedness of ecosystems is required to achieve sustainable management practices.
• Producers must make a profit
  New Zealand is rich with resources to support a variety of primary produce. Primary producers are businesses, and commercial producers only produce products that return a profit. Any new products are carefully selected and a range of factors explored before committing to production.

Science concepts

• Living World
  Ruminant digestion and plantain forage research supports learning about the life processes of animals and plants including key structural features and functions. Other key Living World concepts are environmental suitability related to habitat/niche, adaptations and interdependence – how changes in one part of the environment affect other living organisms living there.
• Planet Earth and Beyond
  Key Earth science concepts include Earth systems, interacting systems, nutrient cycling and the influences humans have on these systems.
• Nature of Science
  Science builds on prior experiences, and the science process asks questions, finds evidence, explores models and investigates using standardised methodologies to develop explanations. Science knowledge is tentative and changes over time.

From a te ao Māori perspective, we are all part of te taiao and have a responsibility to care for it. This perspective – that the land provides for the people and so the people must provide for the land – is in accord with the view of most farmers and primary producers, who see themselves as stewards of the land.

Te ao Māori perspectives

The dairy industry recognises the crucial role it plays in improving and protecting water quality and mitigating greenhouse gas emissions. As stewards of the land, many farmers are working to protect, restore and enhance the environment. This is an approach that aligns with kaitiakitanga – guardianship and care for the environment. Other perspectives to consider are the roles of mātauranga Māori and whakapapa (interconnections).

Interactive planning pathways

Teachers can use Hub resources as starting points for context-based learning. The planning map below provides a gateway to collections of articles, multimedia, student activities and stories of New Zealand’s science research. By using a combination of these resources, teachers can combine conceptual understanding, capabilities development and assessment opportunities into relevant learning experiences.

Resources to support learning

The Hub has created a suite of resources exploring forage research in the dairy sector:

• Dairy innovations – targeting climate change – article
• Ruminant digestion – article
• Ruminant digestion – interactive
• Dairy farming and the nitrogen cycle – article
• The nitrogen cycle and dairy farming – interactive
• Pasture plants – article
• Common pasture plant species – interactive
• Climate change – implications for dairy farming – article
• Plantain – article
• Plantain research – article
• The primary sector and climate change – article
• Dairy farming – key terms – article
• Observing pasture composition – activity
• Measuring pasture mass – activity
• Explore a cow’s digestive system – activity
• Label a cow’s digestive passage – interactive

Collating resources for reference and planning

To sort and annotate these resources for later reference, log in and use the collections tool. A link to a sample collection is in the related content section at the end of this article.