Website encourages student research on Indigenous Australians, Jan 2000

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Website encourages student research on Indigenous Australians


A new Internet resource, designed to introduce Australian school students to facts and figures about Indigenous Australians, has been launched by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).

The facility, called Website Indigenous Statistics Education (WISE), is part of the ABS website at www.abs.gov.au.

WISE introduces Indigenous statistics into the classroom. The project has been designed as an interactive tutorial, showing why Indigenous statistics are important, how ABS defines the term Indigenous and identifies Indigenous peoples, how the bureau estimates and collects data, and in-depth information on population statistics about Indigenous Australians.

It makes extensive use of coloured maps and other visual techniques to make comparisons between the Indigenous and total Australian populations, and to show the distribution of the Indigenous population across the country. WISE also suggests reasons for the increase in the Indigenous population over the last 30 years as counted by the Population and Housing Census.

To encourage understanding and involvement in the material, an extensive Activities section is provided. This features multiple-choice questions, practical tasks, and research and discussion projects to stimulate further investigation and analysis. A comprehensive index helps the student find specific information and there is a reference and bibliography section.

How to find WISE:
  1. Access the ABS website at www.abs.gov.au
  2. Click the Themes button on the Navigator Bar
  3. Click the Education Services link
  4. Click the WISE link.

The ABS encourages media organisations with online news services to link to WISE. Please telephone us if you need help to do this.