copyABC 2017

Questions for discussion

NBN Problems

1 Discuss the BTN story with another student Record the main points of your discussion

2 What does NBN stand for

3 What was dial up internet like

4 Why was broadband internet better than dial up

5 The NBN plan involved replacing the copper cables with what

6 What is the main advantage of using fibre optic cables

7 What changes did the Liberal Party make to the NBN plan

8 What problems have there been with the NBN

9 How will the NBN affect you

10 What do you understand more clearly since watching the BTN story

Write a message about the story and post it in the comments section on the story page

Kokoda 75th Anniversary

1 What did the BTN story explain

2 During which war was the Kokoda campaign

3 Why were Australian soldiers sent to New Guinea

4 New Guinea was a territory of Australia True or false

5 Why were reserve forces sent to New Guinea

6 Why were the soldiers poorly prepared for war

7 Describe the conditions on the Kokoda track

8 What impact did disease and infections have on soldiers

9 How did Papuan people help Australian soldiers

10 Why does the Kokoda campaign remain an important symbol to many Australians today

Check out the Kokoda Anniversary resource on the Teachers page

Making Kokoda VR

1 Briefly explain what the Kokoda VR experience is

2 What does VR stand for

3 What does the Kokoda VR experience recreate

4 Where did the team travel to

5 VR designer Luke used a process called photogrammetry Explain what that is

6 What was Mattrsquos role in the project

7 How did they make the experience as authentic as possible

8 What did the kids interviewed in the story like about the VR experience

9 What are the benefits of using VR to teach kids

10 What was surprising about the BTN story

Episode 30

31st October 2017

copyABC 2017

Write a message about the story and post it in the comments section on the story page

Himalayan Boarding School

1 Before you watch the BTN story predict what you think itrsquos about

2 What is the main point of the BTN story

3 Describe the walk to school for the students

4 Which country does Rigzin live in

5 What is the name of the mountain range where he lives

6 Why is the trip along the river and through the mountains dangerous

7 How does Rigzinrsquos grandfather feel about the journey

8 What does a charity group want to do to help students

9 What will the boarding house mean for students

10 How did the BTN story make you feel

Write a message about the story and post it in the comments section on the story page

BTN Investigates - What is Halloween

1 Working in pairs discuss the BTN Halloween story Record the main points of the discussion

2 It is believed that Halloween is based on ancient________________ traditions

3 Farmers in Ireland held a festival called Samhain True or false

4 What did the festival mark the beginning of

5 All Saints Day is a Christian festival that honours _____________

6 What was the day before All Saints Day called

7 Which two events merged to become Halloween

8 Why did Halloween become a big celebration in America

9 What is the name of the Halloween custom where children travel from house to house to collect sweets

10 What did you learn watching the BTN story

Do the quiz on the BTN website

copyABC 2017

Teacher Resource

Kokoda Anniversary

1 What did the BTN story explain

2 During which war was the Kokoda campaign

3 Why were Australian soldiers sent to New Guinea

4 New Guinea was a territory of Australia True or false

5 Why were reserve forces sent to New Guinea

6 Why were the soldiers poorly prepared for war

7 Describe the conditions on the Kokoda track

8 What impact did disease and infections have on soldiers

9 How did Papuan people help Australian soldiers

10 Why does the Kokoda campaign remain an important symbol to many Australians today

Class Discussion

After watching the BTN Kokoda Anniversary story discuss with students what

they know about the Kokoda campaign Use the following questions to help

guide discussion

bull When did the Kokoda campaign happen

bull Who was involved

bull What images and words come to mind when you think of the Kokoda

campaign

Write a personal response to the Kokoda Anniversary story Leave a

comment on the BTN story page

Glossary of key terms

Students will develop a glossary of historical terms and concepts that relate

to the Kokoda campaign Students will add definitions to the glossary as they

come across unfamiliar words throughout the BTN Kokoda Anniversary story

Students will demonstrate their understanding by writing their own sentences

using historical terms and concepts from the glossary Below are some key

terms and concepts to get you started

Reserve forces Troops Withdraw

Campaign Camouflage Battalion

Episode 30

31st October 2017

Students will develop a deeper understanding of Australiarsquos involvement in the Kokoda campaign

HASS Inquiry and skills

Questioningndash Year 6

Develop appropriate questions to

guide an inquiry about people

events developments places

systems and challenges

HASS Inquiry and skills

Researching ndash Year 6

Locate and collect relevant

information and data from primary

sources and secondary sources

Sequence information about

peoplersquos lives events

developments and phenomena

using a variety of methods

including timelines

(ACHASSI125)

HASS Inquiry and skills

Analysing ndash Years 6 amp 7

Examine primary

sources and secondary sources to

determine their origin and

purpose (ACHASSI126)

Examine primary sources and

secondary sources to determine

their origin purpose and reliability

History Historical Skills

Chronology terms and

concepts ndash Year 7

Sequence historical events

developments and periods

History Historical Skills

Analysis and use of sources ndash

Year 7

Identify the origin and purpose of

primary and secondary sources

copyABC 2017

Timeline of main events

Students will create a timeline to sequence significant events that led to World War II significant events

during World War II and Australiarsquos involvement in World War II

Students will work in small groups to work through the following questions to build on their understanding of

Australiarsquos involvement in World War II Students will find and collect images photographs illustrations and

video as part of their research

bull When did World War II begin and end

bull What was Australiarsquos involvement in World War II

bull Why were Australian troops sent to Kokoda

bull When did the Kokoda campaign begin and end

bull What impact did the Kokoda campaign have on Australia and its people at the time

People

In Papua from July 1942 to January 1943 over 120000 people from different countries fought or supported

the fighting troops

Students will investigate who was involved in the Kokoda campaign and why Students will use the internet

to learn more about the Kokoda campaign from the perspective of the Australians Papuans and Japanese

and use the following table to record their findings

Australians ndash 39th

Battalion

Papuans ndash Papuan

Infantry Battalion

Japanese

Why were you fighting

in New Guinea What

were your objectives

How many people

participated in this

campaign

1942 February Mainland Australia comes under attack when Japanese forces mount two air raids on Darwin

1939 September Germany invades Poland World War II begins 3 Sept ndash Australia enters World War II

1945 September Japan signs surrender agreement ending war

copyABC 2017

Kokoda Research

Students will develop their own questions for inquiry collecting and recording information from a wide

variety of sources

Example ndash Inquiry question

While a lot of Militia were volunteers Australian men could be conscripted or

forced to join the Militia What is conscription Why did Australia have to

conscript men for military service How do you feel about conscription

Students will locate compare select and use information from a range of primary and secondary sources

and then present the information in an interesting way Before starting this activity students will learn more

about the differences between primary and secondary resources and respond to the following

bull What is a primary source Give an example

Through using primary sources a document like a diary painting or a physical object that was

written or created at a particular time we can gain an understanding of what might have happened

at a place in time Example of a primary source ndash Photographs of Japanese bombing raids on Port

Moresby

bull What is a secondary source Give an example

Secondary sources are documents written after an event has occurred providing ldquosecond-handrdquo

accounts of that event person or topic Unlike primary sources which provide first-hand accounts

secondary sources offer different perspectives analysis and conclusions of those accounts

Example of a secondary source ndash The Age May 20 1942 49 Planes in Attack

As part of their research students will need to

bull Use historical terms and concepts in their presentation

bull Refer to the source of the information (ie bibliography)

bull Look for facts and opinions that answer their inquiry questions

Explain your strategy

How successful were

your operations in

Kokoda Did they go

smoothly What were

some of the challenges

Describe some of your

experiences

What was the impact of

this campaign on your

country and people

copyABC 2017

Kokoda Research

Students will develop their own questions for inquiry collecting and recording information from a wide

variety of sources

Example ndash Inquiry question

While a lot of Militia were volunteers Australian men could be conscripted or

forced to join the Militia What is conscription Why did Australia have to

conscript men for military service How do you feel about conscription

Students will locate compare select and use information from a range of primary and secondary sources

and then present the information in an interesting way Before starting this activity students will learn more

about the differences between primary and secondary resources and respond to the following

bull What is a primary source Give an example

Through using primary sources a document like a diary painting or a physical object that was

written or created at a particular time we can gain an understanding of what might have happened

at a place in time Example of a primary source ndash Photographs of Japanese bombing raids on Port

Moresby

bull What is a secondary source Give an example

Secondary sources are documents written after an event has occurred providing ldquosecond-handrdquo

accounts of that event person or topic Unlike primary sources which provide first-hand accounts

secondary sources offer different perspectives analysis and conclusions of those accounts

Example of a secondary source ndash The Age May 20 1942 49 Planes in Attack

As part of their research students will need to

bull Use historical terms and concepts in their presentation

bull Refer to the source of the information (ie bibliography)

bull Look for facts and opinions that answer their inquiry questions

Explain your strategy

How successful were

your operations in

Kokoda Did they go

smoothly What were

some of the challenges

Describe some of your

experiences

What was the impact of

this campaign on your

country and people

copyABC 2017

Weather conditions on the track

Students will watch the ABC Splash Weather and War video that explains the weather conditions the

soldiers experienced on the Kokoda Track Students will respond to the following

o How would you describe the winter of

1942

o How does military historian Jack Ford

describe the weather conditions

o How did the weather give the Japanese

soldiers an advantage

o Give an example of how the weather helped

the Australian soldiers

o Why was it difficult to take supplies along

the Kokoda Track

Conditions on the track

Students will read the following description of the track by Sir Kingsley Norris an army medical officer for the Australian 7th Division Students will then respond to one or more of the questions below

Imagine an area of approximately one hundred miles long Crumple and fold this into a series of ridges

each rising higher and higher until seven thousand feet is reached then declining in ridges to three thousand

feet Cover this thickly with jungle short trees and tall trees tangled with great entwining savage vines

Through an oppression of this density cut a little native track two or three feet wide up the ridges over the

spurs round gorges and down across swiftly-flowing happy mountain streams Where the track clambers up

the mountain sides cut steps - big steps little steps steep steps - or clear the soil from the tree roots

Read the rest of his description here

o How did you feel reading Sir Kingsley Norrisrsquo description of the track

o How does he describe the vegetation on the track

o What do you understand more clearly about the environment of the Kokoda Track after reading his

description

o Imagine climbing and descending the track carrying a weapon and supplies while fighting a better

trained enemy Discuss your thoughts with other students

Visual Literacy ndash Conditions on the Kokoda Track Below are photographs depicting conditions on the track during the Kokoda campaign Students will look at

the images and then respond to the following questions

bull What is happening in the image

bull What does the photo tell you about the conditions on the track

bull How do you think the soldiers might be feeling

bull What questions would you like to ask the soldiers in the photo

bull Create a caption for each image

copyABC 2017

Source The Kokoda Campaign

Source Australian War Memorial

Source Kokoda Historical Source National Museum Australia

Reflection

Students will reflect on what they have learnt about the battle of Kokoda and Australiarsquos involvement in the

campaign overall Students will discuss what they have learnt as a class What questions were raised in the

discussion Use the following questions to help guide the discussion

bull Who was involved in the battle of Kokoda

bull What were the experiences of the Australian soldiers

bull How were Papuans impacted by the Kokoda campaign

bull What were the experiences of the Japanese soldiers

bull What is the significance of Kokoda today

bull Has your thinking about Kokoda changed If so in what ways

copyABC 2017

BTN ndash Kokoda Track

httpwwwabcnetaubtnstorys2219584htm

ABC Splash ndash Weather and war the Kokoda Trail 1942

httpsplashabcnetauwebsplashmedia1668011weather-and-war-kokoda

ABC Splash ndash Reinforcing the 39th on the Kokoda Trail

httpsplashabcnetauhomemedia1485206reinforcing-the-39th-on-the-kokoda-trail

Department of Veteranrsquos Affairs ndash The Kokoda Track

httpanzacportaldvagovauhistoryconflictskokoda-track

copyABC 2017

BTN Episode 30 Transcript 311017

Hi Nathan here Welcome to BTN Coming up today

bull We take a special look at what happened 75 years ago on the Kokoda Track during World War II

bull And well tell you how you can visit the track yourself with BTNs first ever Virtual Reality release

Were really excited to give you an exclusive look at that soon

This Week in News

But first Some big news came out of Australias High Court late last week Lets start today with a quick look at that and some of the other big stories of the week Five Aussie politicians including the Deputy Prime Minister have been booted out of parliament The High Court has ruled that they werent eligible to be elected because they were citizens of another country as well as Australia at that time Thats against the rules set out in the constitution The Court was actually looking at seven politicians - who announced earlier this year that they might have accidently broken the rules Two of them senators Matt Canavan and Nick Xenophon were cleared but the court said the other five have to go They include Greens Senators Larissa Waters and Scott Ludlum One Nation Senator Malcolm Roberts Nationals Senator Fiona Nash and Deputy PM Barnaby Joyce Scott Ludlum has already resigned The other senators will have to give up their seats to someone else in their party As for Barnaby Joyce therell be another vote in his electorate on December 2nd And now that hes given up his New Zealand Citizenship hell be able to try to win his own seat back But in the meantime the government will have to get by without him

Meanwhile Queenslands Premier has called a surprise election

copyABC 2017

The state will head to the polls on the 25th of November which is a few months earlier than expected The election will also be a bit different because the states parliament is expanding And therell be 93 seats to fill instead of 89

Thailand has farewelled its longest serving king King Pumipol Adulyadet died in October last year and the government declared an official year-long period of mourning before his funeral could take place It was held last week and lasted for five days

And a British man has finished an adventure that was straight out of a Pixar film Tom Morgan flew 25 kays across South Africa strapped to 100 helium balloons He said the flight was terrifying but unbelievably cool Sadly he didnt find any talking dogs at the end of it

NBN Problems

Reporter Jack Evans

INTRO This week theres also been a lot of talk about Australias National Broadband Network Its the biggest infrastructure project in Australias history and aims to upgrade the internet speeds right around the country But its copped a lot of criticism lately Heres the background MIKEY Where are we doc DOC 2017 October 31st MIKEY Ooh its Halloween DOC No time for that Mckey the super information hard drive needs updating but if my calculations are correct the NBN should have rolled out by now MIKEY The Norwegian Broadcasting Network DOC No Mikey were in Australia The National Broadband Network MIKEY Whats that DOC Ill show you Get in the Delorean MIKEY Its a Camry

copyABC 2017

DOC Pfft MIKEY Where are we going doc DOC Were going back to the Past MIKEY Ah my ears what is that DOC Oh no Mikey weve gone too far back the 90s MIKEY Make it stop Back in the old days using the internet was a bit like using a home phone you had to dial up Which meant you couldnt make calls at the same time and it was very slow Just seeing a picture took a long time and videos were out of the question But as time went on things got a lot more sophisticated Broadband was introduced which was faster and meant you could have multiple connections at once But it still used the old copper wires that connected peoplersquos phones to their houses and those wires were pretty outdated In 2009 the government announced it was time for an upgrade KEVIN RUDD Like the building of Snowy Hydro like the building of the Sydney Harbour Bridge this is an historic act of nation building The Government at the time planned to replace all the existing copper cables with fibre optic ones Fibre optic cables can transmit a whole lot more data much faster than copper while using less power With Fibre to everyonersquos house The Government promised download speeds of 100 megabits per second That means you could download a TV show in about 16 seconds But it was going to cost about $41 billion and it wouldnt be finished until 2021 MIKEY Shall I set the dial for 2021 doc DOC No Mikey 2013 thats right were going back MICKEY Back to the future DOC Hey thats my line In 2013 the Liberal party won the election They decided the NBN was going to be too expensive so they made some changes Instead of installing fibre optic to everyonersquos house they decided to go with something called Fibre to the Node That means the fibre optic cable is sent out to lots of different points and the copper is used for that last little distance to peoplersquos houses The government said it was still going to be a serious upgrade It promised average speeds of 25 megabits per second and it would be ready earlier MIKEY Is that enough to upgrade the super information hard drive doc DOC No Mikey But it is enough to download all 3 back to the future movies The trouble is the NBN hasnt worked out quite as planned Costs have blown out were up to almost $50 billion and a lot of people have complained that the speeds arent nearly as good as promised Plus some houses managed to get fibre to their homes before the

copyABC 2017

NBN changed and theyve ended up with much better internet connections and some say thats not fair The Governments blamed previous leaders for the NBNs problems and says that eventually Australia will have the internet speeds it needs MIKEY Is that true doc DOC Well theres only one way to find out MIKEY Back to the future DOC You know it Mikey

Kokoda 75th Anniversary

Reporter Jack Evans

INTRO This Thursday the 2nd of November marks the 75th anniversary of a big moment in Australias military history On that day Australian soldiers recaptured Kokoda after a long and difficult campaign to stop a Japanese invasion of Papua Heres a look back at the campaign and why it was so important The Kokoda track is an important place to a lot of Australians Every year hundreds of people come here to tackle the gruelling ninety-six-kilometre trail For some its about a challenge but for others itrsquos about remembering those who fought here to protect Australia during World War II It was 1941 the War had been raging for 2 years and it was getting closer to Australia Japanese forces had invaded a number of countries in south-east Asia and many people worried Australia would be next But first the Japanese army would have to get to what we now know as Papua New Guinea which was actually a territory of Australia at the time Its thought that Japan was intending to take control of New Guinea before invading Australia But a lot Australian Soldiers were far from home fighting the war in Europe So the Australian Government decided to send reserve forces to New Guinea Around 5000 men were shipped off to Port Moresby in December 1941 They werent professional soldiers their job was supposed to be to protect Australia on the home front They werent trained very well they didnt have modern equipment and many were very young It was on the Kokoda track that the Aussie Soldiers held off the Japanese army But the Kokoda track is tough Its narrow steep muddy and takes 8 days to finish The days were hot and the nights freezing the Australians used whatever they could find to help them up the track By the time they even encountered the Japanese they would be wet tired and covered in mud Between July and November in 1942 there were a series of battles on the Kokoda track More than 600 Australians died in the fighting and thousands more were injured The tropical conditions meant diseases like Malaria spread amongst the soldiers and around 4000 died of sickness Getting supplies over the difficult terrain was also a problem for both sides the Aussie Troops had help from Papuan people who scouted locations and Carried supplies and wounded soldiers In August trained soldiers were sent to Port Moresby to back up Australian troops and soon afterward Japan started to withdraw In November Australia recaptured Kokoda

copyABC 2017

In the years since the Kokoda Campaign has been seen a defining moment in Australiarsquos history It was just a small part of Australias involvement in the second world war which would go on for another 3 years But it remains an important symbol of Australians fighting to protect their home country

Making Kokoda VR

Reporter Matthew Holbrook

INTRO Now to mark the anniversary of the Kokoda Campaign and to help teach kids more about what happened there weve been working on something really special a Virtual Reality experience of the Kokoda track Its called Kokoda VR and over 12 chapters it transports you to real life locations in PNG where you can hear and take part in the story Itll be released to the public on Thursday but we asked Matt to give you an exclusive sneak peek Hello My name is Matt I normally do things like this and this and this But for most of this year Ive been part of a team working on this We wanted to tell the story of Kokoda in a way no-one ever has before using virtual reality Placing you in real life locations and recreations of real life scenes from 1942 So even if you cant walk the track yourself you can still travel there in VR But lets go back a bit At the end of last year our team started investigating how we could teach kids about Kokoda using virtual reality The first step to go to PNG and capture the track So alongside a lecturer and students from Torrens University thats exactly what we did Unlike the thousands of people who walk the track each year we cheated by flying in on a helicopter Even without having to walk it all it was still a lot of work Luke our VR Designer took tens of thousands of photos just on one day including more than a thousand of this rock alone Theyre used in a process called photogrammetry which uses hundreds of photos to build up an accurate 3D model of something that can then be put into and even picked up in VR Along the way Id been working on the script and researching the Kokoda campaign So once we got back from PNG that script had to be brought to life alongside our incredible locations Luckily Id created these very realistic storyboards to help make that easier for our animators We had a few final things to capture in photogrammetry so we went to the SA Army Museum to capture more than 40 real weapons artefacts and uniforms to make this experience seem as authentic as possible Finally the developers our software experts put everything together and helped make Kokoda VR interactive BOY This looks so good BOY It kind of took me by surprise I knew there was going to be a battle but I wasnt expecting it to be as realistic I think it would be a really good learning opportunity for everyone and I think its highly engaging

copyABC 2017

GIRL Its not like youre in a classroom and taking notes about what theyre doing its like youre doing it with them and youre experiencing what theyre experiencing its cool As VR becomes more common it could soon be a lot easier to travel to faraway places from the comfort of your own classroom To learn and explore in new ways But for now were giving kids around Australia and the world the opportunity to do that with Kokoda and learn why its such an important part of our history

Kokoda VR Project

Now as we said before you will be able to download Kokoda VR for yourself for free from Thursday onwards and teachers itll also come with resources for use in your class whether you teach upper primary or high school For all the details just go to our website on the 2nd of November to find out how you can visit Kokoda through virtual reality

Ask a Reporter

And still on the subject if youve got a question about Kokoda or VR ask Matt and I live on Friday during Ask a Reporter

Head to our website for all the details

Himalayan Boarding School

Reporter Ruby Cornish

INTRO Next up Imagine having to trek for days through some of the worlds most dangerous terrain just to get to school Thats a challenge some kids in a remote part of the Himalayas face at the moment But an Australian charity is trying to help by building a boarding house to help kids get an education safely This might just be the worlds most dangerous walk to school For most of us trekking through the snow navigating icy rivers and crossing rickety bridges would constitute a pretty serious adventure But thats what kids like 10-year-old Rigzin go through just to get to a classroom Rigzin lives with his grandfather and three-year-old sister in a village called Zanskar Itrsquos in a remote part of the Himalayas in India It spends half the year under a blanket of snow A lot of the kids living here go to a boarding school in town but at the end of the winter break the bad weather means the streets out of the village are blocked off So instead intrepid students spend days winding their way along the frozen Chadar River and through the mountains Its a dangerous trip and it can take days Rigzins grandfather says he gets scared that something bad could happen TSERING Its such a difficult journey Theres a danger you could fall down the steep mountains Sometimes we have to fix a rope and lower ourselves down But its the only way many kids in this community can get an education RIGZIN School is important for my life

copyABC 2017

Soon things could be looking up thanks to a small Aussie charity Its operators have spent years convincing local authorities to let them set up a boarding house in the Zanskar Valley The 80-bed building will be somewhere students - and their teachers - can stay during the winter months when theyre not at school and they cant get home Itll mean these guys can get an education and not have to risk their lives in the process Rigzins sister is still too young for school but the new building could be up and running by the time shes old enough to go TSERING School is very important We have to send her to school So with any luck the dangerous Chadar Trek will be a thing of the past before too long

Quiz

Okay time for a quiz now What is the name of the highest peak within the Himalayas Is it

K2

Mount Everest

Mount Kosciuszko The answer is Mount Everest

Teacher Awards

Have you got a teacher you want to thank for being amazing Well nominate them for BTNs teacher awards All it takes is a short video telling us and showing us why you think they are the best around Nominations close on the 24th of November For more information just head to our website

Sport

A mare called Winx has just become the 2nd horse ever to win the Cox Plate three times in a row COMMENTATOR Jupidors coming at her but Winx is holding on The great mare completes the great trilogy Shes now the highest earning horse in Aussie racing history after taking out the one point eight-million-dollar prize

copyABC 2017

But she seems pretty humble about the whole thing

Lewis Hamilton has won his fourth Formula One drivers world championship COMMENTATOR Hamilton is world champion in 2017 The British racer had a bit of a bumpy start to the Mexican Grand Prix on the weekend but he managed to finish in 9th position There are still two races to go but Hamilton is too far ahead in the standings for anyone to catch him now

Australia suffered its first loss in the Womenrsquos Ashes series The home side was up two nil heading in to this weekendrsquos one dayer England set a hefty target of 285 and while Alyssa Heely and Nicole Bolton looked on track to reach it for the Aussies COMMENTATOR Could be out should be out is out Thatrsquos Brunt out there Alyssa was dismissed for 71 and the Aussies lost momentum losing by 20 runs And finally to a race that has given a whole new meaning to the phrase Doggy Paddle Over the weekend more than 100 dogs and their masters took part in the first ever PUPS on SUPS race at Currumbin Creek in QLD MAN Irsquove got a dog and a paddle board and I live down the road So I thought Irsquod give it a crack There was a menrsquos and womenrsquos division but the top dog went to Ray and his pooch who won the 250 dash for cash MAN Hes a good boy I was reassuring him he was a good boy the whole way around

BTN Investigates ndash Halloween

Reporter Ruby Cornish

INTRO Hi BTN my name is Shelby My question is why do we celebrate Halloween

Halloween had arrived on a warm day in Spring And young trick or treaters were doing their thing Among them this trio was going door to door They had a good haul but they wanted more They walked up to a house on a quiet back street And as the door opened they asked trick or treat A ghastly figure replied Heres some goodies I baked And the zombie picked out a frosted cupcake But he discovered a note where there should have been cream And it read your treat is the story behind Halloween

copyABC 2017

The three friends looked at the vampire in surprise A mischievous glimmer had appeared in her eyes She said let me tell you about Halloweens history And the holiday might become less of a mystery The friends exchanged glances then said yeah okay Because they knew very little about the spooky holiday Okay so maybe Halloween isnt your thing After all its not been a very big deal here in Australia in the past But every year its becoming more and more popular here Its exact origins are a bit mysterious but its believed to have roots in ancient Celtic traditions dating back at least two thousand years Famers living a part of the world now known as Ireland held a festival called Samhain (and yep its really spelled like that) to mark the end of the harvest and the beginning of winter Back then the Celts celebrated their new year on the first of November and the day before was seen as a time when the realms of the living and the dead became blurred Villagers lit bonfires believing they were warding off evil spirits and dressed up as demons so that if they happened to bump into one it wouldnt bat an eyelid In the 9th century Christianity arrived in Celtic lands bringing with it a holiday called All Saints Day a day for people to remember and honour saints The day before it was called All Hallows Eve Because they were held on the same day its thought that Samhain and All Hallows Eve eventually merged to become the occasion we now call Halloween Irish immigrants took the tradition to the US where it took off Dressing up and trick or treating became big in the 1930s and its been helped along ever since by the companies that make money by selling lollies and costumes and pumpkins and all the rest So the real reasons behind Halloweenrsquo the vampire said Are to farewell the summer and ward off the un-dead To remember the saints and the faithful whove gone Out of nowhere the cat said Well I think youre wrong That might be why Pagans began the tradition But these days Halloween has a new definition For us its all about getting dressed up And seeing how much junk food we can round up The bloodsucker nodded she knew they were right These days Halloween was a different kind of night She handed over her plateful of sweets And the cat ghost and zombie headed back to the streets

Closer

And thats it for today but theres always more to see and do on our website Including our BTN Teacher Awards nomination page and later this week details on how you can download Kokoda VR Thanks for joining us and Irsquoll see you next week for more BTN

copyABC 2017

The state will head to the polls on the 25th of November which is a few months earlier than expected The election will also be a bit different because the states parliament is expanding And therell be 93 seats to fill instead of 89

Thailand has farewelled its longest serving king King Pumipol Adulyadet died in October last year and the government declared an official year-long period of mourning before his funeral could take place It was held last week and lasted for five days

And a British man has finished an adventure that was straight out of a Pixar film Tom Morgan flew 25 kays across South Africa strapped to 100 helium balloons He said the flight was terrifying but unbelievably cool Sadly he didnt find any talking dogs at the end of it

NBN Problems

Reporter Jack Evans

INTRO This week theres also been a lot of talk about Australias National Broadband Network Its the biggest infrastructure project in Australias history and aims to upgrade the internet speeds right around the country But its copped a lot of criticism lately Heres the background MIKEY Where are we doc DOC 2017 October 31st MIKEY Ooh its Halloween DOC No time for that Mckey the super information hard drive needs updating but if my calculations are correct the NBN should have rolled out by now MIKEY The Norwegian Broadcasting Network DOC No Mikey were in Australia The National Broadband Network MIKEY Whats that DOC Ill show you Get in the Delorean MIKEY Its a Camry

copyABC 2017

DOC Pfft MIKEY Where are we going doc DOC Were going back to the Past MIKEY Ah my ears what is that DOC Oh no Mikey weve gone too far back the 90s MIKEY Make it stop Back in the old days using the internet was a bit like using a home phone you had to dial up Which meant you couldnt make calls at the same time and it was very slow Just seeing a picture took a long time and videos were out of the question But as time went on things got a lot more sophisticated Broadband was introduced which was faster and meant you could have multiple connections at once But it still used the old copper wires that connected peoplersquos phones to their houses and those wires were pretty outdated In 2009 the government announced it was time for an upgrade KEVIN RUDD Like the building of Snowy Hydro like the building of the Sydney Harbour Bridge this is an historic act of nation building The Government at the time planned to replace all the existing copper cables with fibre optic ones Fibre optic cables can transmit a whole lot more data much faster than copper while using less power With Fibre to everyonersquos house The Government promised download speeds of 100 megabits per second That means you could download a TV show in about 16 seconds But it was going to cost about $41 billion and it wouldnt be finished until 2021 MIKEY Shall I set the dial for 2021 doc DOC No Mikey 2013 thats right were going back MICKEY Back to the future DOC Hey thats my line In 2013 the Liberal party won the election They decided the NBN was going to be too expensive so they made some changes Instead of installing fibre optic to everyonersquos house they decided to go with something called Fibre to the Node That means the fibre optic cable is sent out to lots of different points and the copper is used for that last little distance to peoplersquos houses The government said it was still going to be a serious upgrade It promised average speeds of 25 megabits per second and it would be ready earlier MIKEY Is that enough to upgrade the super information hard drive doc DOC No Mikey But it is enough to download all 3 back to the future movies The trouble is the NBN hasnt worked out quite as planned Costs have blown out were up to almost $50 billion and a lot of people have complained that the speeds arent nearly as good as promised Plus some houses managed to get fibre to their homes before the

copyABC 2017

NBN changed and theyve ended up with much better internet connections and some say thats not fair The Governments blamed previous leaders for the NBNs problems and says that eventually Australia will have the internet speeds it needs MIKEY Is that true doc DOC Well theres only one way to find out MIKEY Back to the future DOC You know it Mikey

Kokoda 75th Anniversary

Reporter Jack Evans

INTRO This Thursday the 2nd of November marks the 75th anniversary of a big moment in Australias military history On that day Australian soldiers recaptured Kokoda after a long and difficult campaign to stop a Japanese invasion of Papua Heres a look back at the campaign and why it was so important The Kokoda track is an important place to a lot of Australians Every year hundreds of people come here to tackle the gruelling ninety-six-kilometre trail For some its about a challenge but for others itrsquos about remembering those who fought here to protect Australia during World War II It was 1941 the War had been raging for 2 years and it was getting closer to Australia Japanese forces had invaded a number of countries in south-east Asia and many people worried Australia would be next But first the Japanese army would have to get to what we now know as Papua New Guinea which was actually a territory of Australia at the time Its thought that Japan was intending to take control of New Guinea before invading Australia But a lot Australian Soldiers were far from home fighting the war in Europe So the Australian Government decided to send reserve forces to New Guinea Around 5000 men were shipped off to Port Moresby in December 1941 They werent professional soldiers their job was supposed to be to protect Australia on the home front They werent trained very well they didnt have modern equipment and many were very young It was on the Kokoda track that the Aussie Soldiers held off the Japanese army But the Kokoda track is tough Its narrow steep muddy and takes 8 days to finish The days were hot and the nights freezing the Australians used whatever they could find to help them up the track By the time they even encountered the Japanese they would be wet tired and covered in mud Between July and November in 1942 there were a series of battles on the Kokoda track More than 600 Australians died in the fighting and thousands more were injured The tropical conditions meant diseases like Malaria spread amongst the soldiers and around 4000 died of sickness Getting supplies over the difficult terrain was also a problem for both sides the Aussie Troops had help from Papuan people who scouted locations and Carried supplies and wounded soldiers In August trained soldiers were sent to Port Moresby to back up Australian troops and soon afterward Japan started to withdraw In November Australia recaptured Kokoda

copyABC 2017

In the years since the Kokoda Campaign has been seen a defining moment in Australiarsquos history It was just a small part of Australias involvement in the second world war which would go on for another 3 years But it remains an important symbol of Australians fighting to protect their home country

Making Kokoda VR

Reporter Matthew Holbrook

INTRO Now to mark the anniversary of the Kokoda Campaign and to help teach kids more about what happened there weve been working on something really special a Virtual Reality experience of the Kokoda track Its called Kokoda VR and over 12 chapters it transports you to real life locations in PNG where you can hear and take part in the story Itll be released to the public on Thursday but we asked Matt to give you an exclusive sneak peek Hello My name is Matt I normally do things like this and this and this But for most of this year Ive been part of a team working on this We wanted to tell the story of Kokoda in a way no-one ever has before using virtual reality Placing you in real life locations and recreations of real life scenes from 1942 So even if you cant walk the track yourself you can still travel there in VR But lets go back a bit At the end of last year our team started investigating how we could teach kids about Kokoda using virtual reality The first step to go to PNG and capture the track So alongside a lecturer and students from Torrens University thats exactly what we did Unlike the thousands of people who walk the track each year we cheated by flying in on a helicopter Even without having to walk it all it was still a lot of work Luke our VR Designer took tens of thousands of photos just on one day including more than a thousand of this rock alone Theyre used in a process called photogrammetry which uses hundreds of photos to build up an accurate 3D model of something that can then be put into and even picked up in VR Along the way Id been working on the script and researching the Kokoda campaign So once we got back from PNG that script had to be brought to life alongside our incredible locations Luckily Id created these very realistic storyboards to help make that easier for our animators We had a few final things to capture in photogrammetry so we went to the SA Army Museum to capture more than 40 real weapons artefacts and uniforms to make this experience seem as authentic as possible Finally the developers our software experts put everything together and helped make Kokoda VR interactive BOY This looks so good BOY It kind of took me by surprise I knew there was going to be a battle but I wasnt expecting it to be as realistic I think it would be a really good learning opportunity for everyone and I think its highly engaging

copyABC 2017

GIRL Its not like youre in a classroom and taking notes about what theyre doing its like youre doing it with them and youre experiencing what theyre experiencing its cool As VR becomes more common it could soon be a lot easier to travel to faraway places from the comfort of your own classroom To learn and explore in new ways But for now were giving kids around Australia and the world the opportunity to do that with Kokoda and learn why its such an important part of our history

Kokoda VR Project

Now as we said before you will be able to download Kokoda VR for yourself for free from Thursday onwards and teachers itll also come with resources for use in your class whether you teach upper primary or high school For all the details just go to our website on the 2nd of November to find out how you can visit Kokoda through virtual reality

Ask a Reporter

And still on the subject if youve got a question about Kokoda or VR ask Matt and I live on Friday during Ask a Reporter

Head to our website for all the details

Himalayan Boarding School

Reporter Ruby Cornish

INTRO Next up Imagine having to trek for days through some of the worlds most dangerous terrain just to get to school Thats a challenge some kids in a remote part of the Himalayas face at the moment But an Australian charity is trying to help by building a boarding house to help kids get an education safely This might just be the worlds most dangerous walk to school For most of us trekking through the snow navigating icy rivers and crossing rickety bridges would constitute a pretty serious adventure But thats what kids like 10-year-old Rigzin go through just to get to a classroom Rigzin lives with his grandfather and three-year-old sister in a village called Zanskar Itrsquos in a remote part of the Himalayas in India It spends half the year under a blanket of snow A lot of the kids living here go to a boarding school in town but at the end of the winter break the bad weather means the streets out of the village are blocked off So instead intrepid students spend days winding their way along the frozen Chadar River and through the mountains Its a dangerous trip and it can take days Rigzins grandfather says he gets scared that something bad could happen TSERING Its such a difficult journey Theres a danger you could fall down the steep mountains Sometimes we have to fix a rope and lower ourselves down But its the only way many kids in this community can get an education RIGZIN School is important for my life

copyABC 2017

Soon things could be looking up thanks to a small Aussie charity Its operators have spent years convincing local authorities to let them set up a boarding house in the Zanskar Valley The 80-bed building will be somewhere students - and their teachers - can stay during the winter months when theyre not at school and they cant get home Itll mean these guys can get an education and not have to risk their lives in the process Rigzins sister is still too young for school but the new building could be up and running by the time shes old enough to go TSERING School is very important We have to send her to school So with any luck the dangerous Chadar Trek will be a thing of the past before too long

Quiz

Okay time for a quiz now What is the name of the highest peak within the Himalayas Is it

K2

Mount Everest

Mount Kosciuszko The answer is Mount Everest

Teacher Awards

Have you got a teacher you want to thank for being amazing Well nominate them for BTNs teacher awards All it takes is a short video telling us and showing us why you think they are the best around Nominations close on the 24th of November For more information just head to our website

Sport

A mare called Winx has just become the 2nd horse ever to win the Cox Plate three times in a row COMMENTATOR Jupidors coming at her but Winx is holding on The great mare completes the great trilogy Shes now the highest earning horse in Aussie racing history after taking out the one point eight-million-dollar prize

copyABC 2017

But she seems pretty humble about the whole thing

Lewis Hamilton has won his fourth Formula One drivers world championship COMMENTATOR Hamilton is world champion in 2017 The British racer had a bit of a bumpy start to the Mexican Grand Prix on the weekend but he managed to finish in 9th position There are still two races to go but Hamilton is too far ahead in the standings for anyone to catch him now

Australia suffered its first loss in the Womenrsquos Ashes series The home side was up two nil heading in to this weekendrsquos one dayer England set a hefty target of 285 and while Alyssa Heely and Nicole Bolton looked on track to reach it for the Aussies COMMENTATOR Could be out should be out is out Thatrsquos Brunt out there Alyssa was dismissed for 71 and the Aussies lost momentum losing by 20 runs And finally to a race that has given a whole new meaning to the phrase Doggy Paddle Over the weekend more than 100 dogs and their masters took part in the first ever PUPS on SUPS race at Currumbin Creek in QLD MAN Irsquove got a dog and a paddle board and I live down the road So I thought Irsquod give it a crack There was a menrsquos and womenrsquos division but the top dog went to Ray and his pooch who won the 250 dash for cash MAN Hes a good boy I was reassuring him he was a good boy the whole way around

BTN Investigates ndash Halloween

Reporter Ruby Cornish

INTRO Hi BTN my name is Shelby My question is why do we celebrate Halloween

Halloween had arrived on a warm day in Spring And young trick or treaters were doing their thing Among them this trio was going door to door They had a good haul but they wanted more They walked up to a house on a quiet back street And as the door opened they asked trick or treat A ghastly figure replied Heres some goodies I baked And the zombie picked out a frosted cupcake But he discovered a note where there should have been cream And it read your treat is the story behind Halloween

copyABC 2017

The three friends looked at the vampire in surprise A mischievous glimmer had appeared in her eyes She said let me tell you about Halloweens history And the holiday might become less of a mystery The friends exchanged glances then said yeah okay Because they knew very little about the spooky holiday Okay so maybe Halloween isnt your thing After all its not been a very big deal here in Australia in the past But every year its becoming more and more popular here Its exact origins are a bit mysterious but its believed to have roots in ancient Celtic traditions dating back at least two thousand years Famers living a part of the world now known as Ireland held a festival called Samhain (and yep its really spelled like that) to mark the end of the harvest and the beginning of winter Back then the Celts celebrated their new year on the first of November and the day before was seen as a time when the realms of the living and the dead became blurred Villagers lit bonfires believing they were warding off evil spirits and dressed up as demons so that if they happened to bump into one it wouldnt bat an eyelid In the 9th century Christianity arrived in Celtic lands bringing with it a holiday called All Saints Day a day for people to remember and honour saints The day before it was called All Hallows Eve Because they were held on the same day its thought that Samhain and All Hallows Eve eventually merged to become the occasion we now call Halloween Irish immigrants took the tradition to the US where it took off Dressing up and trick or treating became big in the 1930s and its been helped along ever since by the companies that make money by selling lollies and costumes and pumpkins and all the rest So the real reasons behind Halloweenrsquo the vampire said Are to farewell the summer and ward off the un-dead To remember the saints and the faithful whove gone Out of nowhere the cat said Well I think youre wrong That might be why Pagans began the tradition But these days Halloween has a new definition For us its all about getting dressed up And seeing how much junk food we can round up The bloodsucker nodded she knew they were right These days Halloween was a different kind of night She handed over her plateful of sweets And the cat ghost and zombie headed back to the streets

Closer

And thats it for today but theres always more to see and do on our website Including our BTN Teacher Awards nomination page and later this week details on how you can download Kokoda VR Thanks for joining us and Irsquoll see you next week for more BTN

copyABC 2017

DOC Pfft MIKEY Where are we going doc DOC Were going back to the Past MIKEY Ah my ears what is that DOC Oh no Mikey weve gone too far back the 90s MIKEY Make it stop Back in the old days using the internet was a bit like using a home phone you had to dial up Which meant you couldnt make calls at the same time and it was very slow Just seeing a picture took a long time and videos were out of the question But as time went on things got a lot more sophisticated Broadband was introduced which was faster and meant you could have multiple connections at once But it still used the old copper wires that connected peoplersquos phones to their houses and those wires were pretty outdated In 2009 the government announced it was time for an upgrade KEVIN RUDD Like the building of Snowy Hydro like the building of the Sydney Harbour Bridge this is an historic act of nation building The Government at the time planned to replace all the existing copper cables with fibre optic ones Fibre optic cables can transmit a whole lot more data much faster than copper while using less power With Fibre to everyonersquos house The Government promised download speeds of 100 megabits per second That means you could download a TV show in about 16 seconds But it was going to cost about $41 billion and it wouldnt be finished until 2021 MIKEY Shall I set the dial for 2021 doc DOC No Mikey 2013 thats right were going back MICKEY Back to the future DOC Hey thats my line In 2013 the Liberal party won the election They decided the NBN was going to be too expensive so they made some changes Instead of installing fibre optic to everyonersquos house they decided to go with something called Fibre to the Node That means the fibre optic cable is sent out to lots of different points and the copper is used for that last little distance to peoplersquos houses The government said it was still going to be a serious upgrade It promised average speeds of 25 megabits per second and it would be ready earlier MIKEY Is that enough to upgrade the super information hard drive doc DOC No Mikey But it is enough to download all 3 back to the future movies The trouble is the NBN hasnt worked out quite as planned Costs have blown out were up to almost $50 billion and a lot of people have complained that the speeds arent nearly as good as promised Plus some houses managed to get fibre to their homes before the

copyABC 2017

NBN changed and theyve ended up with much better internet connections and some say thats not fair The Governments blamed previous leaders for the NBNs problems and says that eventually Australia will have the internet speeds it needs MIKEY Is that true doc DOC Well theres only one way to find out MIKEY Back to the future DOC You know it Mikey

Kokoda 75th Anniversary

Reporter Jack Evans

INTRO This Thursday the 2nd of November marks the 75th anniversary of a big moment in Australias military history On that day Australian soldiers recaptured Kokoda after a long and difficult campaign to stop a Japanese invasion of Papua Heres a look back at the campaign and why it was so important The Kokoda track is an important place to a lot of Australians Every year hundreds of people come here to tackle the gruelling ninety-six-kilometre trail For some its about a challenge but for others itrsquos about remembering those who fought here to protect Australia during World War II It was 1941 the War had been raging for 2 years and it was getting closer to Australia Japanese forces had invaded a number of countries in south-east Asia and many people worried Australia would be next But first the Japanese army would have to get to what we now know as Papua New Guinea which was actually a territory of Australia at the time Its thought that Japan was intending to take control of New Guinea before invading Australia But a lot Australian Soldiers were far from home fighting the war in Europe So the Australian Government decided to send reserve forces to New Guinea Around 5000 men were shipped off to Port Moresby in December 1941 They werent professional soldiers their job was supposed to be to protect Australia on the home front They werent trained very well they didnt have modern equipment and many were very young It was on the Kokoda track that the Aussie Soldiers held off the Japanese army But the Kokoda track is tough Its narrow steep muddy and takes 8 days to finish The days were hot and the nights freezing the Australians used whatever they could find to help them up the track By the time they even encountered the Japanese they would be wet tired and covered in mud Between July and November in 1942 there were a series of battles on the Kokoda track More than 600 Australians died in the fighting and thousands more were injured The tropical conditions meant diseases like Malaria spread amongst the soldiers and around 4000 died of sickness Getting supplies over the difficult terrain was also a problem for both sides the Aussie Troops had help from Papuan people who scouted locations and Carried supplies and wounded soldiers In August trained soldiers were sent to Port Moresby to back up Australian troops and soon afterward Japan started to withdraw In November Australia recaptured Kokoda

copyABC 2017

In the years since the Kokoda Campaign has been seen a defining moment in Australiarsquos history It was just a small part of Australias involvement in the second world war which would go on for another 3 years But it remains an important symbol of Australians fighting to protect their home country

Making Kokoda VR

Reporter Matthew Holbrook

INTRO Now to mark the anniversary of the Kokoda Campaign and to help teach kids more about what happened there weve been working on something really special a Virtual Reality experience of the Kokoda track Its called Kokoda VR and over 12 chapters it transports you to real life locations in PNG where you can hear and take part in the story Itll be released to the public on Thursday but we asked Matt to give you an exclusive sneak peek Hello My name is Matt I normally do things like this and this and this But for most of this year Ive been part of a team working on this We wanted to tell the story of Kokoda in a way no-one ever has before using virtual reality Placing you in real life locations and recreations of real life scenes from 1942 So even if you cant walk the track yourself you can still travel there in VR But lets go back a bit At the end of last year our team started investigating how we could teach kids about Kokoda using virtual reality The first step to go to PNG and capture the track So alongside a lecturer and students from Torrens University thats exactly what we did Unlike the thousands of people who walk the track each year we cheated by flying in on a helicopter Even without having to walk it all it was still a lot of work Luke our VR Designer took tens of thousands of photos just on one day including more than a thousand of this rock alone Theyre used in a process called photogrammetry which uses hundreds of photos to build up an accurate 3D model of something that can then be put into and even picked up in VR Along the way Id been working on the script and researching the Kokoda campaign So once we got back from PNG that script had to be brought to life alongside our incredible locations Luckily Id created these very realistic storyboards to help make that easier for our animators We had a few final things to capture in photogrammetry so we went to the SA Army Museum to capture more than 40 real weapons artefacts and uniforms to make this experience seem as authentic as possible Finally the developers our software experts put everything together and helped make Kokoda VR interactive BOY This looks so good BOY It kind of took me by surprise I knew there was going to be a battle but I wasnt expecting it to be as realistic I think it would be a really good learning opportunity for everyone and I think its highly engaging

copyABC 2017

GIRL Its not like youre in a classroom and taking notes about what theyre doing its like youre doing it with them and youre experiencing what theyre experiencing its cool As VR becomes more common it could soon be a lot easier to travel to faraway places from the comfort of your own classroom To learn and explore in new ways But for now were giving kids around Australia and the world the opportunity to do that with Kokoda and learn why its such an important part of our history

Kokoda VR Project

Now as we said before you will be able to download Kokoda VR for yourself for free from Thursday onwards and teachers itll also come with resources for use in your class whether you teach upper primary or high school For all the details just go to our website on the 2nd of November to find out how you can visit Kokoda through virtual reality

Ask a Reporter

And still on the subject if youve got a question about Kokoda or VR ask Matt and I live on Friday during Ask a Reporter

Head to our website for all the details

Himalayan Boarding School

Reporter Ruby Cornish

INTRO Next up Imagine having to trek for days through some of the worlds most dangerous terrain just to get to school Thats a challenge some kids in a remote part of the Himalayas face at the moment But an Australian charity is trying to help by building a boarding house to help kids get an education safely This might just be the worlds most dangerous walk to school For most of us trekking through the snow navigating icy rivers and crossing rickety bridges would constitute a pretty serious adventure But thats what kids like 10-year-old Rigzin go through just to get to a classroom Rigzin lives with his grandfather and three-year-old sister in a village called Zanskar Itrsquos in a remote part of the Himalayas in India It spends half the year under a blanket of snow A lot of the kids living here go to a boarding school in town but at the end of the winter break the bad weather means the streets out of the village are blocked off So instead intrepid students spend days winding their way along the frozen Chadar River and through the mountains Its a dangerous trip and it can take days Rigzins grandfather says he gets scared that something bad could happen TSERING Its such a difficult journey Theres a danger you could fall down the steep mountains Sometimes we have to fix a rope and lower ourselves down But its the only way many kids in this community can get an education RIGZIN School is important for my life

copyABC 2017

Soon things could be looking up thanks to a small Aussie charity Its operators have spent years convincing local authorities to let them set up a boarding house in the Zanskar Valley The 80-bed building will be somewhere students - and their teachers - can stay during the winter months when theyre not at school and they cant get home Itll mean these guys can get an education and not have to risk their lives in the process Rigzins sister is still too young for school but the new building could be up and running by the time shes old enough to go TSERING School is very important We have to send her to school So with any luck the dangerous Chadar Trek will be a thing of the past before too long

Quiz

Okay time for a quiz now What is the name of the highest peak within the Himalayas Is it

K2

Mount Everest

Mount Kosciuszko The answer is Mount Everest

Teacher Awards

Have you got a teacher you want to thank for being amazing Well nominate them for BTNs teacher awards All it takes is a short video telling us and showing us why you think they are the best around Nominations close on the 24th of November For more information just head to our website

Sport

A mare called Winx has just become the 2nd horse ever to win the Cox Plate three times in a row COMMENTATOR Jupidors coming at her but Winx is holding on The great mare completes the great trilogy Shes now the highest earning horse in Aussie racing history after taking out the one point eight-million-dollar prize

copyABC 2017

But she seems pretty humble about the whole thing

Lewis Hamilton has won his fourth Formula One drivers world championship COMMENTATOR Hamilton is world champion in 2017 The British racer had a bit of a bumpy start to the Mexican Grand Prix on the weekend but he managed to finish in 9th position There are still two races to go but Hamilton is too far ahead in the standings for anyone to catch him now

Australia suffered its first loss in the Womenrsquos Ashes series The home side was up two nil heading in to this weekendrsquos one dayer England set a hefty target of 285 and while Alyssa Heely and Nicole Bolton looked on track to reach it for the Aussies COMMENTATOR Could be out should be out is out Thatrsquos Brunt out there Alyssa was dismissed for 71 and the Aussies lost momentum losing by 20 runs And finally to a race that has given a whole new meaning to the phrase Doggy Paddle Over the weekend more than 100 dogs and their masters took part in the first ever PUPS on SUPS race at Currumbin Creek in QLD MAN Irsquove got a dog and a paddle board and I live down the road So I thought Irsquod give it a crack There was a menrsquos and womenrsquos division but the top dog went to Ray and his pooch who won the 250 dash for cash MAN Hes a good boy I was reassuring him he was a good boy the whole way around

BTN Investigates ndash Halloween

Reporter Ruby Cornish

INTRO Hi BTN my name is Shelby My question is why do we celebrate Halloween

Halloween had arrived on a warm day in Spring And young trick or treaters were doing their thing Among them this trio was going door to door They had a good haul but they wanted more They walked up to a house on a quiet back street And as the door opened they asked trick or treat A ghastly figure replied Heres some goodies I baked And the zombie picked out a frosted cupcake But he discovered a note where there should have been cream And it read your treat is the story behind Halloween

copyABC 2017

The three friends looked at the vampire in surprise A mischievous glimmer had appeared in her eyes She said let me tell you about Halloweens history And the holiday might become less of a mystery The friends exchanged glances then said yeah okay Because they knew very little about the spooky holiday Okay so maybe Halloween isnt your thing After all its not been a very big deal here in Australia in the past But every year its becoming more and more popular here Its exact origins are a bit mysterious but its believed to have roots in ancient Celtic traditions dating back at least two thousand years Famers living a part of the world now known as Ireland held a festival called Samhain (and yep its really spelled like that) to mark the end of the harvest and the beginning of winter Back then the Celts celebrated their new year on the first of November and the day before was seen as a time when the realms of the living and the dead became blurred Villagers lit bonfires believing they were warding off evil spirits and dressed up as demons so that if they happened to bump into one it wouldnt bat an eyelid In the 9th century Christianity arrived in Celtic lands bringing with it a holiday called All Saints Day a day for people to remember and honour saints The day before it was called All Hallows Eve Because they were held on the same day its thought that Samhain and All Hallows Eve eventually merged to become the occasion we now call Halloween Irish immigrants took the tradition to the US where it took off Dressing up and trick or treating became big in the 1930s and its been helped along ever since by the companies that make money by selling lollies and costumes and pumpkins and all the rest So the real reasons behind Halloweenrsquo the vampire said Are to farewell the summer and ward off the un-dead To remember the saints and the faithful whove gone Out of nowhere the cat said Well I think youre wrong That might be why Pagans began the tradition But these days Halloween has a new definition For us its all about getting dressed up And seeing how much junk food we can round up The bloodsucker nodded she knew they were right These days Halloween was a different kind of night She handed over her plateful of sweets And the cat ghost and zombie headed back to the streets

Closer

And thats it for today but theres always more to see and do on our website Including our BTN Teacher Awards nomination page and later this week details on how you can download Kokoda VR Thanks for joining us and Irsquoll see you next week for more BTN

copyABC 2017

NBN changed and theyve ended up with much better internet connections and some say thats not fair The Governments blamed previous leaders for the NBNs problems and says that eventually Australia will have the internet speeds it needs MIKEY Is that true doc DOC Well theres only one way to find out MIKEY Back to the future DOC You know it Mikey

Kokoda 75th Anniversary

Reporter Jack Evans

INTRO This Thursday the 2nd of November marks the 75th anniversary of a big moment in Australias military history On that day Australian soldiers recaptured Kokoda after a long and difficult campaign to stop a Japanese invasion of Papua Heres a look back at the campaign and why it was so important The Kokoda track is an important place to a lot of Australians Every year hundreds of people come here to tackle the gruelling ninety-six-kilometre trail For some its about a challenge but for others itrsquos about remembering those who fought here to protect Australia during World War II It was 1941 the War had been raging for 2 years and it was getting closer to Australia Japanese forces had invaded a number of countries in south-east Asia and many people worried Australia would be next But first the Japanese army would have to get to what we now know as Papua New Guinea which was actually a territory of Australia at the time Its thought that Japan was intending to take control of New Guinea before invading Australia But a lot Australian Soldiers were far from home fighting the war in Europe So the Australian Government decided to send reserve forces to New Guinea Around 5000 men were shipped off to Port Moresby in December 1941 They werent professional soldiers their job was supposed to be to protect Australia on the home front They werent trained very well they didnt have modern equipment and many were very young It was on the Kokoda track that the Aussie Soldiers held off the Japanese army But the Kokoda track is tough Its narrow steep muddy and takes 8 days to finish The days were hot and the nights freezing the Australians used whatever they could find to help them up the track By the time they even encountered the Japanese they would be wet tired and covered in mud Between July and November in 1942 there were a series of battles on the Kokoda track More than 600 Australians died in the fighting and thousands more were injured The tropical conditions meant diseases like Malaria spread amongst the soldiers and around 4000 died of sickness Getting supplies over the difficult terrain was also a problem for both sides the Aussie Troops had help from Papuan people who scouted locations and Carried supplies and wounded soldiers In August trained soldiers were sent to Port Moresby to back up Australian troops and soon afterward Japan started to withdraw In November Australia recaptured Kokoda

copyABC 2017

In the years since the Kokoda Campaign has been seen a defining moment in Australiarsquos history It was just a small part of Australias involvement in the second world war which would go on for another 3 years But it remains an important symbol of Australians fighting to protect their home country

Making Kokoda VR

Reporter Matthew Holbrook

INTRO Now to mark the anniversary of the Kokoda Campaign and to help teach kids more about what happened there weve been working on something really special a Virtual Reality experience of the Kokoda track Its called Kokoda VR and over 12 chapters it transports you to real life locations in PNG where you can hear and take part in the story Itll be released to the public on Thursday but we asked Matt to give you an exclusive sneak peek Hello My name is Matt I normally do things like this and this and this But for most of this year Ive been part of a team working on this We wanted to tell the story of Kokoda in a way no-one ever has before using virtual reality Placing you in real life locations and recreations of real life scenes from 1942 So even if you cant walk the track yourself you can still travel there in VR But lets go back a bit At the end of last year our team started investigating how we could teach kids about Kokoda using virtual reality The first step to go to PNG and capture the track So alongside a lecturer and students from Torrens University thats exactly what we did Unlike the thousands of people who walk the track each year we cheated by flying in on a helicopter Even without having to walk it all it was still a lot of work Luke our VR Designer took tens of thousands of photos just on one day including more than a thousand of this rock alone Theyre used in a process called photogrammetry which uses hundreds of photos to build up an accurate 3D model of something that can then be put into and even picked up in VR Along the way Id been working on the script and researching the Kokoda campaign So once we got back from PNG that script had to be brought to life alongside our incredible locations Luckily Id created these very realistic storyboards to help make that easier for our animators We had a few final things to capture in photogrammetry so we went to the SA Army Museum to capture more than 40 real weapons artefacts and uniforms to make this experience seem as authentic as possible Finally the developers our software experts put everything together and helped make Kokoda VR interactive BOY This looks so good BOY It kind of took me by surprise I knew there was going to be a battle but I wasnt expecting it to be as realistic I think it would be a really good learning opportunity for everyone and I think its highly engaging

copyABC 2017

GIRL Its not like youre in a classroom and taking notes about what theyre doing its like youre doing it with them and youre experiencing what theyre experiencing its cool As VR becomes more common it could soon be a lot easier to travel to faraway places from the comfort of your own classroom To learn and explore in new ways But for now were giving kids around Australia and the world the opportunity to do that with Kokoda and learn why its such an important part of our history

Kokoda VR Project

Now as we said before you will be able to download Kokoda VR for yourself for free from Thursday onwards and teachers itll also come with resources for use in your class whether you teach upper primary or high school For all the details just go to our website on the 2nd of November to find out how you can visit Kokoda through virtual reality

Ask a Reporter

And still on the subject if youve got a question about Kokoda or VR ask Matt and I live on Friday during Ask a Reporter

Head to our website for all the details

Himalayan Boarding School

Reporter Ruby Cornish

INTRO Next up Imagine having to trek for days through some of the worlds most dangerous terrain just to get to school Thats a challenge some kids in a remote part of the Himalayas face at the moment But an Australian charity is trying to help by building a boarding house to help kids get an education safely This might just be the worlds most dangerous walk to school For most of us trekking through the snow navigating icy rivers and crossing rickety bridges would constitute a pretty serious adventure But thats what kids like 10-year-old Rigzin go through just to get to a classroom Rigzin lives with his grandfather and three-year-old sister in a village called Zanskar Itrsquos in a remote part of the Himalayas in India It spends half the year under a blanket of snow A lot of the kids living here go to a boarding school in town but at the end of the winter break the bad weather means the streets out of the village are blocked off So instead intrepid students spend days winding their way along the frozen Chadar River and through the mountains Its a dangerous trip and it can take days Rigzins grandfather says he gets scared that something bad could happen TSERING Its such a difficult journey Theres a danger you could fall down the steep mountains Sometimes we have to fix a rope and lower ourselves down But its the only way many kids in this community can get an education RIGZIN School is important for my life

copyABC 2017

Soon things could be looking up thanks to a small Aussie charity Its operators have spent years convincing local authorities to let them set up a boarding house in the Zanskar Valley The 80-bed building will be somewhere students - and their teachers - can stay during the winter months when theyre not at school and they cant get home Itll mean these guys can get an education and not have to risk their lives in the process Rigzins sister is still too young for school but the new building could be up and running by the time shes old enough to go TSERING School is very important We have to send her to school So with any luck the dangerous Chadar Trek will be a thing of the past before too long

Quiz

Okay time for a quiz now What is the name of the highest peak within the Himalayas Is it

K2

Mount Everest

Mount Kosciuszko The answer is Mount Everest

Teacher Awards

Have you got a teacher you want to thank for being amazing Well nominate them for BTNs teacher awards All it takes is a short video telling us and showing us why you think they are the best around Nominations close on the 24th of November For more information just head to our website

Sport

A mare called Winx has just become the 2nd horse ever to win the Cox Plate three times in a row COMMENTATOR Jupidors coming at her but Winx is holding on The great mare completes the great trilogy Shes now the highest earning horse in Aussie racing history after taking out the one point eight-million-dollar prize

copyABC 2017

But she seems pretty humble about the whole thing

Lewis Hamilton has won his fourth Formula One drivers world championship COMMENTATOR Hamilton is world champion in 2017 The British racer had a bit of a bumpy start to the Mexican Grand Prix on the weekend but he managed to finish in 9th position There are still two races to go but Hamilton is too far ahead in the standings for anyone to catch him now

Australia suffered its first loss in the Womenrsquos Ashes series The home side was up two nil heading in to this weekendrsquos one dayer England set a hefty target of 285 and while Alyssa Heely and Nicole Bolton looked on track to reach it for the Aussies COMMENTATOR Could be out should be out is out Thatrsquos Brunt out there Alyssa was dismissed for 71 and the Aussies lost momentum losing by 20 runs And finally to a race that has given a whole new meaning to the phrase Doggy Paddle Over the weekend more than 100 dogs and their masters took part in the first ever PUPS on SUPS race at Currumbin Creek in QLD MAN Irsquove got a dog and a paddle board and I live down the road So I thought Irsquod give it a crack There was a menrsquos and womenrsquos division but the top dog went to Ray and his pooch who won the 250 dash for cash MAN Hes a good boy I was reassuring him he was a good boy the whole way around

BTN Investigates ndash Halloween

Reporter Ruby Cornish

INTRO Hi BTN my name is Shelby My question is why do we celebrate Halloween

Halloween had arrived on a warm day in Spring And young trick or treaters were doing their thing Among them this trio was going door to door They had a good haul but they wanted more They walked up to a house on a quiet back street And as the door opened they asked trick or treat A ghastly figure replied Heres some goodies I baked And the zombie picked out a frosted cupcake But he discovered a note where there should have been cream And it read your treat is the story behind Halloween

copyABC 2017

The three friends looked at the vampire in surprise A mischievous glimmer had appeared in her eyes She said let me tell you about Halloweens history And the holiday might become less of a mystery The friends exchanged glances then said yeah okay Because they knew very little about the spooky holiday Okay so maybe Halloween isnt your thing After all its not been a very big deal here in Australia in the past But every year its becoming more and more popular here Its exact origins are a bit mysterious but its believed to have roots in ancient Celtic traditions dating back at least two thousand years Famers living a part of the world now known as Ireland held a festival called Samhain (and yep its really spelled like that) to mark the end of the harvest and the beginning of winter Back then the Celts celebrated their new year on the first of November and the day before was seen as a time when the realms of the living and the dead became blurred Villagers lit bonfires believing they were warding off evil spirits and dressed up as demons so that if they happened to bump into one it wouldnt bat an eyelid In the 9th century Christianity arrived in Celtic lands bringing with it a holiday called All Saints Day a day for people to remember and honour saints The day before it was called All Hallows Eve Because they were held on the same day its thought that Samhain and All Hallows Eve eventually merged to become the occasion we now call Halloween Irish immigrants took the tradition to the US where it took off Dressing up and trick or treating became big in the 1930s and its been helped along ever since by the companies that make money by selling lollies and costumes and pumpkins and all the rest So the real reasons behind Halloweenrsquo the vampire said Are to farewell the summer and ward off the un-dead To remember the saints and the faithful whove gone Out of nowhere the cat said Well I think youre wrong That might be why Pagans began the tradition But these days Halloween has a new definition For us its all about getting dressed up And seeing how much junk food we can round up The bloodsucker nodded she knew they were right These days Halloween was a different kind of night She handed over her plateful of sweets And the cat ghost and zombie headed back to the streets

Closer

And thats it for today but theres always more to see and do on our website Including our BTN Teacher Awards nomination page and later this week details on how you can download Kokoda VR Thanks for joining us and Irsquoll see you next week for more BTN

copyABC 2017

In the years since the Kokoda Campaign has been seen a defining moment in Australiarsquos history It was just a small part of Australias involvement in the second world war which would go on for another 3 years But it remains an important symbol of Australians fighting to protect their home country

Making Kokoda VR

Reporter Matthew Holbrook

INTRO Now to mark the anniversary of the Kokoda Campaign and to help teach kids more about what happened there weve been working on something really special a Virtual Reality experience of the Kokoda track Its called Kokoda VR and over 12 chapters it transports you to real life locations in PNG where you can hear and take part in the story Itll be released to the public on Thursday but we asked Matt to give you an exclusive sneak peek Hello My name is Matt I normally do things like this and this and this But for most of this year Ive been part of a team working on this We wanted to tell the story of Kokoda in a way no-one ever has before using virtual reality Placing you in real life locations and recreations of real life scenes from 1942 So even if you cant walk the track yourself you can still travel there in VR But lets go back a bit At the end of last year our team started investigating how we could teach kids about Kokoda using virtual reality The first step to go to PNG and capture the track So alongside a lecturer and students from Torrens University thats exactly what we did Unlike the thousands of people who walk the track each year we cheated by flying in on a helicopter Even without having to walk it all it was still a lot of work Luke our VR Designer took tens of thousands of photos just on one day including more than a thousand of this rock alone Theyre used in a process called photogrammetry which uses hundreds of photos to build up an accurate 3D model of something that can then be put into and even picked up in VR Along the way Id been working on the script and researching the Kokoda campaign So once we got back from PNG that script had to be brought to life alongside our incredible locations Luckily Id created these very realistic storyboards to help make that easier for our animators We had a few final things to capture in photogrammetry so we went to the SA Army Museum to capture more than 40 real weapons artefacts and uniforms to make this experience seem as authentic as possible Finally the developers our software experts put everything together and helped make Kokoda VR interactive BOY This looks so good BOY It kind of took me by surprise I knew there was going to be a battle but I wasnt expecting it to be as realistic I think it would be a really good learning opportunity for everyone and I think its highly engaging

copyABC 2017

GIRL Its not like youre in a classroom and taking notes about what theyre doing its like youre doing it with them and youre experiencing what theyre experiencing its cool As VR becomes more common it could soon be a lot easier to travel to faraway places from the comfort of your own classroom To learn and explore in new ways But for now were giving kids around Australia and the world the opportunity to do that with Kokoda and learn why its such an important part of our history

Kokoda VR Project

Now as we said before you will be able to download Kokoda VR for yourself for free from Thursday onwards and teachers itll also come with resources for use in your class whether you teach upper primary or high school For all the details just go to our website on the 2nd of November to find out how you can visit Kokoda through virtual reality

Ask a Reporter

And still on the subject if youve got a question about Kokoda or VR ask Matt and I live on Friday during Ask a Reporter

Head to our website for all the details

Himalayan Boarding School

Reporter Ruby Cornish

INTRO Next up Imagine having to trek for days through some of the worlds most dangerous terrain just to get to school Thats a challenge some kids in a remote part of the Himalayas face at the moment But an Australian charity is trying to help by building a boarding house to help kids get an education safely This might just be the worlds most dangerous walk to school For most of us trekking through the snow navigating icy rivers and crossing rickety bridges would constitute a pretty serious adventure But thats what kids like 10-year-old Rigzin go through just to get to a classroom Rigzin lives with his grandfather and three-year-old sister in a village called Zanskar Itrsquos in a remote part of the Himalayas in India It spends half the year under a blanket of snow A lot of the kids living here go to a boarding school in town but at the end of the winter break the bad weather means the streets out of the village are blocked off So instead intrepid students spend days winding their way along the frozen Chadar River and through the mountains Its a dangerous trip and it can take days Rigzins grandfather says he gets scared that something bad could happen TSERING Its such a difficult journey Theres a danger you could fall down the steep mountains Sometimes we have to fix a rope and lower ourselves down But its the only way many kids in this community can get an education RIGZIN School is important for my life

copyABC 2017

Soon things could be looking up thanks to a small Aussie charity Its operators have spent years convincing local authorities to let them set up a boarding house in the Zanskar Valley The 80-bed building will be somewhere students - and their teachers - can stay during the winter months when theyre not at school and they cant get home Itll mean these guys can get an education and not have to risk their lives in the process Rigzins sister is still too young for school but the new building could be up and running by the time shes old enough to go TSERING School is very important We have to send her to school So with any luck the dangerous Chadar Trek will be a thing of the past before too long

Quiz

Okay time for a quiz now What is the name of the highest peak within the Himalayas Is it

K2

Mount Everest

Mount Kosciuszko The answer is Mount Everest

Teacher Awards

Have you got a teacher you want to thank for being amazing Well nominate them for BTNs teacher awards All it takes is a short video telling us and showing us why you think they are the best around Nominations close on the 24th of November For more information just head to our website

Sport

A mare called Winx has just become the 2nd horse ever to win the Cox Plate three times in a row COMMENTATOR Jupidors coming at her but Winx is holding on The great mare completes the great trilogy Shes now the highest earning horse in Aussie racing history after taking out the one point eight-million-dollar prize

copyABC 2017

But she seems pretty humble about the whole thing

Lewis Hamilton has won his fourth Formula One drivers world championship COMMENTATOR Hamilton is world champion in 2017 The British racer had a bit of a bumpy start to the Mexican Grand Prix on the weekend but he managed to finish in 9th position There are still two races to go but Hamilton is too far ahead in the standings for anyone to catch him now

Australia suffered its first loss in the Womenrsquos Ashes series The home side was up two nil heading in to this weekendrsquos one dayer England set a hefty target of 285 and while Alyssa Heely and Nicole Bolton looked on track to reach it for the Aussies COMMENTATOR Could be out should be out is out Thatrsquos Brunt out there Alyssa was dismissed for 71 and the Aussies lost momentum losing by 20 runs And finally to a race that has given a whole new meaning to the phrase Doggy Paddle Over the weekend more than 100 dogs and their masters took part in the first ever PUPS on SUPS race at Currumbin Creek in QLD MAN Irsquove got a dog and a paddle board and I live down the road So I thought Irsquod give it a crack There was a menrsquos and womenrsquos division but the top dog went to Ray and his pooch who won the 250 dash for cash MAN Hes a good boy I was reassuring him he was a good boy the whole way around

BTN Investigates ndash Halloween

Reporter Ruby Cornish

INTRO Hi BTN my name is Shelby My question is why do we celebrate Halloween

Halloween had arrived on a warm day in Spring And young trick or treaters were doing their thing Among them this trio was going door to door They had a good haul but they wanted more They walked up to a house on a quiet back street And as the door opened they asked trick or treat A ghastly figure replied Heres some goodies I baked And the zombie picked out a frosted cupcake But he discovered a note where there should have been cream And it read your treat is the story behind Halloween

copyABC 2017

The three friends looked at the vampire in surprise A mischievous glimmer had appeared in her eyes She said let me tell you about Halloweens history And the holiday might become less of a mystery The friends exchanged glances then said yeah okay Because they knew very little about the spooky holiday Okay so maybe Halloween isnt your thing After all its not been a very big deal here in Australia in the past But every year its becoming more and more popular here Its exact origins are a bit mysterious but its believed to have roots in ancient Celtic traditions dating back at least two thousand years Famers living a part of the world now known as Ireland held a festival called Samhain (and yep its really spelled like that) to mark the end of the harvest and the beginning of winter Back then the Celts celebrated their new year on the first of November and the day before was seen as a time when the realms of the living and the dead became blurred Villagers lit bonfires believing they were warding off evil spirits and dressed up as demons so that if they happened to bump into one it wouldnt bat an eyelid In the 9th century Christianity arrived in Celtic lands bringing with it a holiday called All Saints Day a day for people to remember and honour saints The day before it was called All Hallows Eve Because they were held on the same day its thought that Samhain and All Hallows Eve eventually merged to become the occasion we now call Halloween Irish immigrants took the tradition to the US where it took off Dressing up and trick or treating became big in the 1930s and its been helped along ever since by the companies that make money by selling lollies and costumes and pumpkins and all the rest So the real reasons behind Halloweenrsquo the vampire said Are to farewell the summer and ward off the un-dead To remember the saints and the faithful whove gone Out of nowhere the cat said Well I think youre wrong That might be why Pagans began the tradition But these days Halloween has a new definition For us its all about getting dressed up And seeing how much junk food we can round up The bloodsucker nodded she knew they were right These days Halloween was a different kind of night She handed over her plateful of sweets And the cat ghost and zombie headed back to the streets

Closer

And thats it for today but theres always more to see and do on our website Including our BTN Teacher Awards nomination page and later this week details on how you can download Kokoda VR Thanks for joining us and Irsquoll see you next week for more BTN

copyABC 2017

GIRL Its not like youre in a classroom and taking notes about what theyre doing its like youre doing it with them and youre experiencing what theyre experiencing its cool As VR becomes more common it could soon be a lot easier to travel to faraway places from the comfort of your own classroom To learn and explore in new ways But for now were giving kids around Australia and the world the opportunity to do that with Kokoda and learn why its such an important part of our history

Kokoda VR Project

Now as we said before you will be able to download Kokoda VR for yourself for free from Thursday onwards and teachers itll also come with resources for use in your class whether you teach upper primary or high school For all the details just go to our website on the 2nd of November to find out how you can visit Kokoda through virtual reality

Ask a Reporter

And still on the subject if youve got a question about Kokoda or VR ask Matt and I live on Friday during Ask a Reporter

Head to our website for all the details

Himalayan Boarding School

Reporter Ruby Cornish

INTRO Next up Imagine having to trek for days through some of the worlds most dangerous terrain just to get to school Thats a challenge some kids in a remote part of the Himalayas face at the moment But an Australian charity is trying to help by building a boarding house to help kids get an education safely This might just be the worlds most dangerous walk to school For most of us trekking through the snow navigating icy rivers and crossing rickety bridges would constitute a pretty serious adventure But thats what kids like 10-year-old Rigzin go through just to get to a classroom Rigzin lives with his grandfather and three-year-old sister in a village called Zanskar Itrsquos in a remote part of the Himalayas in India It spends half the year under a blanket of snow A lot of the kids living here go to a boarding school in town but at the end of the winter break the bad weather means the streets out of the village are blocked off So instead intrepid students spend days winding their way along the frozen Chadar River and through the mountains Its a dangerous trip and it can take days Rigzins grandfather says he gets scared that something bad could happen TSERING Its such a difficult journey Theres a danger you could fall down the steep mountains Sometimes we have to fix a rope and lower ourselves down But its the only way many kids in this community can get an education RIGZIN School is important for my life

copyABC 2017

Soon things could be looking up thanks to a small Aussie charity Its operators have spent years convincing local authorities to let them set up a boarding house in the Zanskar Valley The 80-bed building will be somewhere students - and their teachers - can stay during the winter months when theyre not at school and they cant get home Itll mean these guys can get an education and not have to risk their lives in the process Rigzins sister is still too young for school but the new building could be up and running by the time shes old enough to go TSERING School is very important We have to send her to school So with any luck the dangerous Chadar Trek will be a thing of the past before too long

Quiz

Okay time for a quiz now What is the name of the highest peak within the Himalayas Is it

K2

Mount Everest

Mount Kosciuszko The answer is Mount Everest

Teacher Awards

Have you got a teacher you want to thank for being amazing Well nominate them for BTNs teacher awards All it takes is a short video telling us and showing us why you think they are the best around Nominations close on the 24th of November For more information just head to our website

Sport

A mare called Winx has just become the 2nd horse ever to win the Cox Plate three times in a row COMMENTATOR Jupidors coming at her but Winx is holding on The great mare completes the great trilogy Shes now the highest earning horse in Aussie racing history after taking out the one point eight-million-dollar prize

copyABC 2017

But she seems pretty humble about the whole thing

Lewis Hamilton has won his fourth Formula One drivers world championship COMMENTATOR Hamilton is world champion in 2017 The British racer had a bit of a bumpy start to the Mexican Grand Prix on the weekend but he managed to finish in 9th position There are still two races to go but Hamilton is too far ahead in the standings for anyone to catch him now

Australia suffered its first loss in the Womenrsquos Ashes series The home side was up two nil heading in to this weekendrsquos one dayer England set a hefty target of 285 and while Alyssa Heely and Nicole Bolton looked on track to reach it for the Aussies COMMENTATOR Could be out should be out is out Thatrsquos Brunt out there Alyssa was dismissed for 71 and the Aussies lost momentum losing by 20 runs And finally to a race that has given a whole new meaning to the phrase Doggy Paddle Over the weekend more than 100 dogs and their masters took part in the first ever PUPS on SUPS race at Currumbin Creek in QLD MAN Irsquove got a dog and a paddle board and I live down the road So I thought Irsquod give it a crack There was a menrsquos and womenrsquos division but the top dog went to Ray and his pooch who won the 250 dash for cash MAN Hes a good boy I was reassuring him he was a good boy the whole way around

BTN Investigates ndash Halloween

Reporter Ruby Cornish

INTRO Hi BTN my name is Shelby My question is why do we celebrate Halloween

Halloween had arrived on a warm day in Spring And young trick or treaters were doing their thing Among them this trio was going door to door They had a good haul but they wanted more They walked up to a house on a quiet back street And as the door opened they asked trick or treat A ghastly figure replied Heres some goodies I baked And the zombie picked out a frosted cupcake But he discovered a note where there should have been cream And it read your treat is the story behind Halloween

copyABC 2017

The three friends looked at the vampire in surprise A mischievous glimmer had appeared in her eyes She said let me tell you about Halloweens history And the holiday might become less of a mystery The friends exchanged glances then said yeah okay Because they knew very little about the spooky holiday Okay so maybe Halloween isnt your thing After all its not been a very big deal here in Australia in the past But every year its becoming more and more popular here Its exact origins are a bit mysterious but its believed to have roots in ancient Celtic traditions dating back at least two thousand years Famers living a part of the world now known as Ireland held a festival called Samhain (and yep its really spelled like that) to mark the end of the harvest and the beginning of winter Back then the Celts celebrated their new year on the first of November and the day before was seen as a time when the realms of the living and the dead became blurred Villagers lit bonfires believing they were warding off evil spirits and dressed up as demons so that if they happened to bump into one it wouldnt bat an eyelid In the 9th century Christianity arrived in Celtic lands bringing with it a holiday called All Saints Day a day for people to remember and honour saints The day before it was called All Hallows Eve Because they were held on the same day its thought that Samhain and All Hallows Eve eventually merged to become the occasion we now call Halloween Irish immigrants took the tradition to the US where it took off Dressing up and trick or treating became big in the 1930s and its been helped along ever since by the companies that make money by selling lollies and costumes and pumpkins and all the rest So the real reasons behind Halloweenrsquo the vampire said Are to farewell the summer and ward off the un-dead To remember the saints and the faithful whove gone Out of nowhere the cat said Well I think youre wrong That might be why Pagans began the tradition But these days Halloween has a new definition For us its all about getting dressed up And seeing how much junk food we can round up The bloodsucker nodded she knew they were right These days Halloween was a different kind of night She handed over her plateful of sweets And the cat ghost and zombie headed back to the streets

Closer

And thats it for today but theres always more to see and do on our website Including our BTN Teacher Awards nomination page and later this week details on how you can download Kokoda VR Thanks for joining us and Irsquoll see you next week for more BTN

copyABC 2017

Soon things could be looking up thanks to a small Aussie charity Its operators have spent years convincing local authorities to let them set up a boarding house in the Zanskar Valley The 80-bed building will be somewhere students - and their teachers - can stay during the winter months when theyre not at school and they cant get home Itll mean these guys can get an education and not have to risk their lives in the process Rigzins sister is still too young for school but the new building could be up and running by the time shes old enough to go TSERING School is very important We have to send her to school So with any luck the dangerous Chadar Trek will be a thing of the past before too long

Quiz

Okay time for a quiz now What is the name of the highest peak within the Himalayas Is it

K2

Mount Everest

Mount Kosciuszko The answer is Mount Everest

Teacher Awards

Have you got a teacher you want to thank for being amazing Well nominate them for BTNs teacher awards All it takes is a short video telling us and showing us why you think they are the best around Nominations close on the 24th of November For more information just head to our website

Sport

A mare called Winx has just become the 2nd horse ever to win the Cox Plate three times in a row COMMENTATOR Jupidors coming at her but Winx is holding on The great mare completes the great trilogy Shes now the highest earning horse in Aussie racing history after taking out the one point eight-million-dollar prize

copyABC 2017

But she seems pretty humble about the whole thing

Lewis Hamilton has won his fourth Formula One drivers world championship COMMENTATOR Hamilton is world champion in 2017 The British racer had a bit of a bumpy start to the Mexican Grand Prix on the weekend but he managed to finish in 9th position There are still two races to go but Hamilton is too far ahead in the standings for anyone to catch him now

Australia suffered its first loss in the Womenrsquos Ashes series The home side was up two nil heading in to this weekendrsquos one dayer England set a hefty target of 285 and while Alyssa Heely and Nicole Bolton looked on track to reach it for the Aussies COMMENTATOR Could be out should be out is out Thatrsquos Brunt out there Alyssa was dismissed for 71 and the Aussies lost momentum losing by 20 runs And finally to a race that has given a whole new meaning to the phrase Doggy Paddle Over the weekend more than 100 dogs and their masters took part in the first ever PUPS on SUPS race at Currumbin Creek in QLD MAN Irsquove got a dog and a paddle board and I live down the road So I thought Irsquod give it a crack There was a menrsquos and womenrsquos division but the top dog went to Ray and his pooch who won the 250 dash for cash MAN Hes a good boy I was reassuring him he was a good boy the whole way around

BTN Investigates ndash Halloween

Reporter Ruby Cornish

INTRO Hi BTN my name is Shelby My question is why do we celebrate Halloween

Halloween had arrived on a warm day in Spring And young trick or treaters were doing their thing Among them this trio was going door to door They had a good haul but they wanted more They walked up to a house on a quiet back street And as the door opened they asked trick or treat A ghastly figure replied Heres some goodies I baked And the zombie picked out a frosted cupcake But he discovered a note where there should have been cream And it read your treat is the story behind Halloween

copyABC 2017

The three friends looked at the vampire in surprise A mischievous glimmer had appeared in her eyes She said let me tell you about Halloweens history And the holiday might become less of a mystery The friends exchanged glances then said yeah okay Because they knew very little about the spooky holiday Okay so maybe Halloween isnt your thing After all its not been a very big deal here in Australia in the past But every year its becoming more and more popular here Its exact origins are a bit mysterious but its believed to have roots in ancient Celtic traditions dating back at least two thousand years Famers living a part of the world now known as Ireland held a festival called Samhain (and yep its really spelled like that) to mark the end of the harvest and the beginning of winter Back then the Celts celebrated their new year on the first of November and the day before was seen as a time when the realms of the living and the dead became blurred Villagers lit bonfires believing they were warding off evil spirits and dressed up as demons so that if they happened to bump into one it wouldnt bat an eyelid In the 9th century Christianity arrived in Celtic lands bringing with it a holiday called All Saints Day a day for people to remember and honour saints The day before it was called All Hallows Eve Because they were held on the same day its thought that Samhain and All Hallows Eve eventually merged to become the occasion we now call Halloween Irish immigrants took the tradition to the US where it took off Dressing up and trick or treating became big in the 1930s and its been helped along ever since by the companies that make money by selling lollies and costumes and pumpkins and all the rest So the real reasons behind Halloweenrsquo the vampire said Are to farewell the summer and ward off the un-dead To remember the saints and the faithful whove gone Out of nowhere the cat said Well I think youre wrong That might be why Pagans began the tradition But these days Halloween has a new definition For us its all about getting dressed up And seeing how much junk food we can round up The bloodsucker nodded she knew they were right These days Halloween was a different kind of night She handed over her plateful of sweets And the cat ghost and zombie headed back to the streets

Closer

And thats it for today but theres always more to see and do on our website Including our BTN Teacher Awards nomination page and later this week details on how you can download Kokoda VR Thanks for joining us and Irsquoll see you next week for more BTN

copyABC 2017

But she seems pretty humble about the whole thing

Lewis Hamilton has won his fourth Formula One drivers world championship COMMENTATOR Hamilton is world champion in 2017 The British racer had a bit of a bumpy start to the Mexican Grand Prix on the weekend but he managed to finish in 9th position There are still two races to go but Hamilton is too far ahead in the standings for anyone to catch him now

Australia suffered its first loss in the Womenrsquos Ashes series The home side was up two nil heading in to this weekendrsquos one dayer England set a hefty target of 285 and while Alyssa Heely and Nicole Bolton looked on track to reach it for the Aussies COMMENTATOR Could be out should be out is out Thatrsquos Brunt out there Alyssa was dismissed for 71 and the Aussies lost momentum losing by 20 runs And finally to a race that has given a whole new meaning to the phrase Doggy Paddle Over the weekend more than 100 dogs and their masters took part in the first ever PUPS on SUPS race at Currumbin Creek in QLD MAN Irsquove got a dog and a paddle board and I live down the road So I thought Irsquod give it a crack There was a menrsquos and womenrsquos division but the top dog went to Ray and his pooch who won the 250 dash for cash MAN Hes a good boy I was reassuring him he was a good boy the whole way around

BTN Investigates ndash Halloween

Reporter Ruby Cornish

INTRO Hi BTN my name is Shelby My question is why do we celebrate Halloween

Halloween had arrived on a warm day in Spring And young trick or treaters were doing their thing Among them this trio was going door to door They had a good haul but they wanted more They walked up to a house on a quiet back street And as the door opened they asked trick or treat A ghastly figure replied Heres some goodies I baked And the zombie picked out a frosted cupcake But he discovered a note where there should have been cream And it read your treat is the story behind Halloween

copyABC 2017

The three friends looked at the vampire in surprise A mischievous glimmer had appeared in her eyes She said let me tell you about Halloweens history And the holiday might become less of a mystery The friends exchanged glances then said yeah okay Because they knew very little about the spooky holiday Okay so maybe Halloween isnt your thing After all its not been a very big deal here in Australia in the past But every year its becoming more and more popular here Its exact origins are a bit mysterious but its believed to have roots in ancient Celtic traditions dating back at least two thousand years Famers living a part of the world now known as Ireland held a festival called Samhain (and yep its really spelled like that) to mark the end of the harvest and the beginning of winter Back then the Celts celebrated their new year on the first of November and the day before was seen as a time when the realms of the living and the dead became blurred Villagers lit bonfires believing they were warding off evil spirits and dressed up as demons so that if they happened to bump into one it wouldnt bat an eyelid In the 9th century Christianity arrived in Celtic lands bringing with it a holiday called All Saints Day a day for people to remember and honour saints The day before it was called All Hallows Eve Because they were held on the same day its thought that Samhain and All Hallows Eve eventually merged to become the occasion we now call Halloween Irish immigrants took the tradition to the US where it took off Dressing up and trick or treating became big in the 1930s and its been helped along ever since by the companies that make money by selling lollies and costumes and pumpkins and all the rest So the real reasons behind Halloweenrsquo the vampire said Are to farewell the summer and ward off the un-dead To remember the saints and the faithful whove gone Out of nowhere the cat said Well I think youre wrong That might be why Pagans began the tradition But these days Halloween has a new definition For us its all about getting dressed up And seeing how much junk food we can round up The bloodsucker nodded she knew they were right These days Halloween was a different kind of night She handed over her plateful of sweets And the cat ghost and zombie headed back to the streets

Closer

And thats it for today but theres always more to see and do on our website Including our BTN Teacher Awards nomination page and later this week details on how you can download Kokoda VR Thanks for joining us and Irsquoll see you next week for more BTN

copyABC 2017

The three friends looked at the vampire in surprise A mischievous glimmer had appeared in her eyes She said let me tell you about Halloweens history And the holiday might become less of a mystery The friends exchanged glances then said yeah okay Because they knew very little about the spooky holiday Okay so maybe Halloween isnt your thing After all its not been a very big deal here in Australia in the past But every year its becoming more and more popular here Its exact origins are a bit mysterious but its believed to have roots in ancient Celtic traditions dating back at least two thousand years Famers living a part of the world now known as Ireland held a festival called Samhain (and yep its really spelled like that) to mark the end of the harvest and the beginning of winter Back then the Celts celebrated their new year on the first of November and the day before was seen as a time when the realms of the living and the dead became blurred Villagers lit bonfires believing they were warding off evil spirits and dressed up as demons so that if they happened to bump into one it wouldnt bat an eyelid In the 9th century Christianity arrived in Celtic lands bringing with it a holiday called All Saints Day a day for people to remember and honour saints The day before it was called All Hallows Eve Because they were held on the same day its thought that Samhain and All Hallows Eve eventually merged to become the occasion we now call Halloween Irish immigrants took the tradition to the US where it took off Dressing up and trick or treating became big in the 1930s and its been helped along ever since by the companies that make money by selling lollies and costumes and pumpkins and all the rest So the real reasons behind Halloweenrsquo the vampire said Are to farewell the summer and ward off the un-dead To remember the saints and the faithful whove gone Out of nowhere the cat said Well I think youre wrong That might be why Pagans began the tradition But these days Halloween has a new definition For us its all about getting dressed up And seeing how much junk food we can round up The bloodsucker nodded she knew they were right These days Halloween was a different kind of night She handed over her plateful of sweets And the cat ghost and zombie headed back to the streets

Closer

And thats it for today but theres always more to see and do on our website Including our BTN Teacher Awards nomination page and later this week details on how you can download Kokoda VR Thanks for joining us and Irsquoll see you next week for more BTN