Access to teaching resources
The following links will take you to practical teaching resources to assist you in teaching OHS in the classroom. Click on each of the links below to expand and contract the list of resources.
This document from the Australian Safety and Compensation Council (ASCC) outlines six key principles for teaching health and safety to students preparing to enter the workplace. A concise national guide.
This website provides general information for teachers and host employers about preparing students for work placements. The ASCC published this guide.
Victorian students must successfully complete these online OHS modules prior to participating in work experience programs.
The resources listed below can be used to support delivery of safe@work:
- Unsafe work: what would you do?
DVD of a recent WorkSafe ad campaign with teaching notes to help you use it in the classroom. Get your students thinking about their rights to protection and representation under Victorian OHS laws. Send an email for a free copy of the DVD to: teachingresources@worksafe.vic.au
Why young workers (aged 15 - 24) are more vulnerable than any other age group?
Simple fact sheets and introductory guides for young workers, employers, parents and educators.
Short clip from a video for work experience students (aged 14 – 16 years), introducing basic risk assessment concepts, from the Health & Safety Executive (UK).
Online educational resources for Year 10 students developed by the Institution of Occupational Health and Safety and the Health and Safety Executive (Britain). The Workplace Hazard Awareness Course is comprehensive, highly visual and interactive. It includes games, video clips, discussion topics and student research activities. Don't just visit the site -- register so you can download the resources (free of charge). This site is highly recommended.
Online OHS modules from the Queensland Department of Industrial Relations.
Interactive online tutorial including animations that show what happens when workplace safety is neglected.Developed by WorkCover NSW.
This interactive website (also developed by WorkCover NSW) includes the Don't Risk it computer game.
A collection of OHS resources for secondary school students, developed by Northern Territory WorkSafe. Some great case studies, discussion starters and role play ideas.
Engaging resource with appealing graphics from Workplace Standards Tasmania. Love the dog!
Online OHS course for students in Years 10, 11 and 12. Victoria's Safe@work resources are based on SmartMove.
Canadian training resource that has been implemented across Canada, in some European countries, and in New Zealand and South Australia. Students take an on-line, no-fail "test", and are awarded a "transcript" that can be attached to resumés to demonstrate their basic awareness of OHS. Requires payment of $9 (CAD) fee per student.
Napo and his friends cross language and cultural barriers to introduce OHS, in these amusing claymation videos. Developed by the European Agency for Safety & Health at Work.
Interactive webpages. By clicking on different parts of an image of the human body, students can find out how people in each industry are most likely to get hurt, and what can be done to prevent these injuries. Provides quick and user-friendly access to a selection of WorkSafe's industry-and hazard-specific guidance materials.
There are Injury hotspots for typical student jobs:
Injury hotspot for Hospitality (in Young Workers hotspot)
Injury hotspot for Manufacturing (in Young Workers hotspot)
Injury hotspot for Agriculture
There are Injury hotspots for typical first jobs:
Injury hotspot for Construction (in Young Workers hotspot)
Injury hotspot for Retail (in Young Workers hotspot)
Injury hotspot on Fast Food
- Farm Safety
Farms are places where young people live, work and play. A number of organisations have developed sites to raise awareness of the risks:
Ripper II: Growing Kids on Farms
An education resource for primary schools developed by FarmSafe Australia and the Australian Centre for Agricultural Health & Safety.
- Virtual Hotel
Virtual Office
Virtual Supermarket
Hunt the Hazard
Online games for Year 8 & 9 students from SafeWork South Australia. Concept good; technology could do with an update.
A slip, trip or fall (STF) at work can change your life forever. Online resources developed by the Health & Safety Executive (Britain), focusing on STFs in food retail, catering and construction. Powerful images and downloadable posters.
Comprehensive resources about workplace bullying from this fabulous website for young people.
Think you can’t get hurt babysitting the neighbour’s kids? Guide for young baby-sitters developed by the NSW Commission for Children & Young People.
Three games in film noir style: ?The Cutter?, The Toxic Fog? and ?The Slicer?. You?ll need a fast system and broadband connection to play them. Developed by the Manitoba Workers Compensation Board.
- OHS is usually taught when preparing students for work experience or structured workplace learning placements, or in VET subjects. However, there are many opportunities for integrating OHS across the curriculum – for example, students might research topics such as:
- the impact of the industrial revolution on the health and safety of working people;
- the rise of social reform movements in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in response to unsafe working conditions;
- the impact of rapid technological development on rates and types of occupational disease and injury;
- advances in medical understanding and recognition of occupational injury and disease;
- changes in the willingness of communities to tolerate 'risk'; and/or
- the social and economic impacts of workplace injury and disease in developed and developing nations.
The resources listed below can be used in a range of subject areas – from drama to design, from economics to English, from SOSE to science. The list is not the result of a formal curriculum mapping exercise and is by no means exhaustive. However, it may encourage you to consider using OHS as a topic for integrated learning under the Victorian Essential Learning Standards at Levels 5 – 6 (Years 8 – 10). Some of the resources may be valuable for VCAL or VCE students.
- Unsafe work: what would you do?
DVD of a recent WorkSafe ad campaign with teaching notes to help you use it in the classroom. Get your students thinking about their rights to protection and representation under Victorian OHS laws. For a free copy of the DVD and the teaching notes, send an email to:teachingresources@worksafe.vic.au
Youth-friendly legal information on a wide range of topics from the National Children’s & Youth Law Centre.
Find out more about the role of the Health & Safety Representative, by visiting this website, created and maintained by the Victorian Trades Hall Council’s OHS Unit.
Pages written for post-compulsory students who are working casual, part-time or seasonal jobs, developed by RMIT Union Legal Service and RMIT Student Union.
Australian Council of Trade Unions' site offers fact sheets, student activity sheets and quizzes on a wide range of OHS issues, including workplace bullying, occupational violence, fatigue and stress.
Resources developed by the Youth Safe Committee of the Labor Council of New South Wales.
This industrial relations information is aimed at students. The Office for Industrial Relations, New South Wales developed this website.
- Injury Hotspots
Interactive webpages. By clicking on different parts of an image of the human body, students can find out how people in each industry are most likely to get hurt, and what can be done to prevent these injuries. Provides quick and user-friendly access to a selection of WorkSafe Victoria's guidance materials.
The following resources have been developed by the Victorian Applied Learning Association for WorkSafe Victoria. They are mapped to the Victorian Certificate of Applied Learning (VCAL) and Victorian Essential Learning Standards (VELS) for years 9 and 10.
Cooperative logic problems
The cooperative logic problems in this unit focus on the injuries young workers are most likely to receive and industries they are most likely to work in (construction, hospitality, manufacturing and retail).
1. Young workers' injuries
The cooperative logic problem in this unit is based on case studies of young workers.
The purpose of this unit is to:
- make students aware of the injuries young workers are most likely to experience
- develop teamwork skills
- develop problem solving skills.
2. Young workers' injury hotspots
The cooperative logic problem in this unit is based on information from the young workers' Injury Hotspots.
The purpose of this unit is to:
- focus on injuries young people working in the industry are most likely to experience
- develop teamwork skills
- develop problem-solving skills
- develop understanding of percentages.
3. It doesn't hurt to speak up!
There are five activities in this unit utilising the WorkSafe advertisement, "It doesn't hurt to speak up" as the focus or stimulus (email teachingresources@worksafe.vic.gov.au to access a copy)
The purpose of this unit is to:
- develop an awareness of how workplace injuries occur
- develop communication skills and strategies to use in workplace settings to minimise workplace injuries
- help young people recognise the widespread consequences of workplace injuries.
WorkSafe British Columbia developed Student WorkSafe Planning 10, a set of comprehensive multimedia resources specifically designed for the Canadian school curriculum.
Four young Canadians speak about the impact of serious work-related injury on their lives. Graphic re-enactments of the incidents. Developed by WorkSafe British Columbia to support Student WorkSafe Planning 10.
- There really are no accidents
This is a series of powerful advertisements targeting young workers in hospitality, retail, construction and manufacturing industries. It was developed by Ontario's Workplace Safety and Insurance Board. Horrifying! Go to: http://www.youtube.com and search “WSIB commercials”.
Find out how Willy's boss saved him from hurting his coccyx and his dignity while doing the 'style-y front-side nose grind' and other stories. At the same time, learn to "refuse unsafe work, demand proper training and wear proper safety equipment". The website was published by Ontario's Workplace Safety and Insurance Board.
Some gruesome images and simple information about workplace injuries and disease from the New Zealand Department of Labour. Check out the 'Workshops of Horror' pages.
Famous images of child labourers in the United States during the early 20th century.
Rich collection of historical documents and photographs about child labour during the Industrial Revolution and the British factory reform movement. Great for student research, classroom discussions, multimedia projects, plays and debates.
- The British Matchgirls Strike of 1888
One of the earliest strikes protesting dangerous and brutal working conditions. Historic documents and images relating to the strike and to ‘phossy jaw’ – a horrible occupational disease of nineteenth century match workers.
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/TUmatchgirls.htm
http://www.bbc.co.uk/legacies/work/england/london/
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~belghist/Flanders/Pages/phossy.htm
http://www.learningcurve.gov.uk/politics/g8/
*Can’t Take No More Drawing on extensive archival footage, this film (made in the 1980s) documents the fight for occupational health and safety regulation in the United States, from the 1860s to the 1980s. Dated but excellent.
Scream (Supporting Children’s Rights through Education, the Arts and the Media) is a comprehensive set of modules developed by the International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (International Labour Office), designed to raise students’ awareness of the issue of child labour via the visual, literary and performing arts.
Prosecutions
A summary of prosecutions brought by the Victorian WorkCover Authority
Technology and Design
Website developed and maintained by the Ergonomics Society (UK). Authoritative and accessible.
Calling all rock gods! Practice setting up safe power supplies for a rock concert. Very cool.
‘Making technology learning safer’ pages
Transcript of interview (10 July 2006) before Bernie Banton’s death from mesothelioma.
Get students researching the James Hardie compensation case. This link takes you to an audio file and transcript of a report by Barney Porter on ABC radio (27 November 2008).
Napo and his friends cross language and cultural barriers to introduce OHS, in these amusing claymation videos. Developed by the European Agency for Safety & Health at Work.
About Napo:
View excerpts and order copies:
http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/books/napo/
http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/books/napolighten/index.htm
Online resources for learners with limited language and/or literacy skills, developed by the Access and Equity Unit, WorkCover Corporation South Australia (now SafeWork SA), the Workplace Education Service and Adelaide Institute of TAFE.
A Canadian training resource that has also been adopted in some European countries, New Zealand and South Australia. Students take an on-line, no-fail "test", and are awarded a "transcript" that can be attached to resumés to demonstrate their basic awareness of OHS. Requires payment of $9 (CAD) fee per student. New version includes test designed for students with poor literacy skills.
