The Dreamtime are the stories of when all things began for

Aboriginals. They are passed down from generation to generation

by the elders.
Different groups or clans have different Dreaming stories. This is
because they spoke different languages and had different customs.
The land is important to Aboriginal. However ALL the clans saw the
land as important and sacred.

Ancestral beings emerged throughout the Dreamtime. They came

from a variety of places; such as the ground, sky and across the sea.
They can change form from human to plant, to animal.
When the creation work was finished, the ancestral beings went away.
Some of the ancestral beings went into the sky, others went into the
landforms.
They continue to influence life today according to belief.

Traditional paintings of Aboriginal artists & decorated artefacts are

important records of the Dreaming.
Aboriginal paintings can show a variety of things such as; the landscape of
the clan and events.
Aboriginal people often use symbols in their artwork, and people directly
involved with the paintings can give the full meaning.

Tectonic processes are the earth movements that cause the breaking and
bending of the Earths crust. This has influenced the shape of Australia.
Tectonic Plates are the many moving pieces in the earths crust. There are 9
large plates and about a dozen smaller ones.
The larger plates contain the continents and oceans, where they float on
dense layer of rock.
Pangaea is the supercontinent. Geographers believe that if continents
were re-arranged and repositioned they would fit together like a jigsaw.
The supercontinent (Pangaea) then spilt into:
Laurasia (North America, Asia And Europe)
Gondwana (South America,Africa, Antarctica and Australia).
Continental Drift is the theory that the movements of the molten rock known
as convection currents caused the plates to move slowly around the surface
of the Earth.
The movement of the Earths
plates explains both the
present location of continents
and the processes of mountain
building and volcanic activity.
When two plates collide,
mountain ranges are formed.
They are formed by either
folding or faulting.
Fold Mountains are formed
when one plate slides down
under another.
Fault mountains are formed
when layers of rock are
fractured and one section
moves down and another
section moves up.

Mountains can be formed by folding and faulting processes, and also

by volcanic activity, which usually take place around the margins of
moving plates.
Mantle is the layer of rock between the Earths crust and the core.
Hot spot volcanoes form in the middle of the tectonic plates directly
above a source of magma (molten lava) located deep beneath the
Earth. A hot spring stays still, though the tectonic plates above it, keep
it moving.