Year 3 Science – Term 3 (WA Curriculum): Earth's Precious Resources - Soils, Rocks and Minerals

What this unit covers

In Term 3, Year 3 Science in the WA Curriculum centres on the unit “Earth's Precious Resources - Soils, Rocks and Minerals”.

Students explore how soils, rocks and minerals are important Earth resources used by humans and other living things in different ways.

Lesson sequence (8 lessons)

The unit breaks down into the following lesson-by-lesson sequence — each title below is a teachable lesson, in order:

1. Discovering What's Under Our Feet - Exploring Soil Layers
2. Soil Detectives - Investigating Local Soil Properties
3. Living Things and Soil - How Animals and Plants Use Soil
4. Humans and Soil - Growing Food and Building Homes
5. Rock and Mineral Treasure Hunt - Finding Earth's Hidden Resources
6. From Earth to Everyday - How We Use Rocks and Minerals
7. Mining and the Environment - Understanding the Impact
8. Protecting Our Earth Resources - Ways to Reduce Environmental Damage

Curriculum codes in this unit

Content codes:

Reading the codes: WA codes (the ones starting with WA) pack the year level, learning area, strand and content number into one string, while the national Australian Curriculum v9 uses a different anatomy that starts with AC9 — same content family, different labels. Our complete WA Curriculum guide decodes both, character by character.

Planning notes for Term 3

WA terms run roughly 9–11 weeks, and in 2026 Term 3 runs from Monday 20 July to Friday 25 September — 10 weeks for WA public schools. With 8 lessons in this unit, that leaves breathing room for assessment, moderation and the weeks that disappear to carnivals, camps and public holidays — plan the assessable work to land two to three weeks before the end of term rather than in the final week.