Year 7 - 9 English
The English curriculum is built around the 3 interrelated strands of Language, Literature and Literacy. Together, the 3 strands focus on developing students’ knowledge, understanding and skills in listening, reading, viewing, speaking, writing and creating. Learning in English is recursive and cumulative, building on concepts, skills and processes developed in earlier years. Students interact with others for a variety of purposes. Students engage with a variety of texts for enjoyment. They listen to, read, view, analyse, interpret, create and perform a range of spoken, written and multimodal texts. Texts may include various types of media, online and digital texts, novels, non-fiction, film, poetry and dramatic performances. The features of these texts may be used by students as models for creating their own work.
Key Topics
| - A Better Place
- Multimodal presentations
- Novel study
- Understanding poetry
| - Movie study
- Indigenous Texts
- Novel study - narrative intervention and personal reflection
- Persuasion
| - Speculative fiction
- Representations of Australia’s peoples, histories and cultures
- Exploring ethical issues in a drama text
- Evaluating characters in a novel
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Assessment
| - Create a range of texts whose purposes may be aesthetic, imaginative, reflective, informative, persuasive and/or analytical; for example, narratives, performances, reports, reviews and arguments for different audiences
| - Students create a range of texts whose purposes may be aesthetic, imaginative, reflective, informative, persuasive and/or analytical; for example, narratives, performances, reports and discussions, literary analyses and reviews for different audiences
| - Students create a range of texts whose purposes may be aesthetic, imaginative, reflective, informative, persuasive, analytical and/or critical; for example, narratives, performances, reports, discussions, literary analyses, arguments, transformations of texts and reviews for a range of audiences
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Reading
| - Students will participate in ability-based reading groups, work in small groups with Classroom Teachers, Support Teachers, and Teacher Aides focusing on building reading comprehension skills using a variety literary and non-literary texts
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Extra Curricular
| - Debating
- Reader’s Challenge
| - Debating
- Spelling Challenge
- Reader’s Challenge
| - Debating
- Reader’s Challenge
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Year 10 English
The English curriculum is built around the 3 interrelated strands of Language, Literature and Literacy. Teaching and learning programs should balance and integrate all 3 strands. Together, the 3 strands focus on developing students’ knowledge, understanding and skills in listening, reading, viewing, speaking, writing and creating. Learning in English is recursive and cumulative, building on concepts, skills and processes developed in earlier years. In Year 10, students interact with others and experience learning in familiar and unfamiliar contexts, including local or global community and vocational contexts.
Students engage with a variety of texts for enjoyment. They analyse, interpret, evaluate, discuss, create and perform a wide range of texts. Texts may include various types of media texts including film, digital and online texts, novels, non-fiction, poetry, dramatic performances and multimodal texts. Themes and issues may involve levels of abstraction, higher order reasoning and intertextual references. Students develop a critical understanding of how texts, language, and visual and audio features are influenced by context.
Key topics: In Year 10 students will explore:
• Narrative Transformation
• Documentary analysis
• Responding to a novel
• Reading and interpreting a Shakespearean play
• Responding to a Shakespearean play
• Exploring perspectives and representations in non-literary texts
Assessment: Students create a range of texts whose purposes may be aesthetic, imaginative, reflective, informative, persuasive, analytical and/or critical; for example, narratives, arguments that include analytical expositions and discussions, analysis and responses that include personal reflections, reviews and critical responses for a range of audiences.
Homework Expectations: 1.5 - 2 hours per week. This includes reading, research and assessment completion.
Costs: The English Department aims to keep all additional costs at a minimum but encourages students to participate in as many extra-curricular activities as possible in order to extend their skills and to enhance their learning opportunities.
Career Opportunities: English is essential for all careers. The ability to communicate clearly through writing and speaking is fundamental to our lives. English may assist in any number of career directions: law, education, medicine, journalism, film, television etc.
Year 11/12 English - General Senior Subject
English focuses on the study of both literary texts and non-literary texts, developing students as independent, innovative and creative learners and thinkers who appreciate the aesthetic use of language, analyse perspectives and evidence, and challenge ideas and interpretations through the analysis and creation of varied texts.
Students have opportunities to engage with language and texts through a range of teaching and learning experiences to foster:
- skills to communicate effectively in Standard Australian English for the purposes of responding to and creating literary and non-literary texts
- skills to make choices about generic structures, language, textual features and technologies for participating actively in literary analysis and the creation of texts in a range of modes, mediums and forms, for a variety of purposes and audiences
- enjoyment and appreciation of literary and non-literary texts, the aesthetic use of language, and style
- creative thinking and imagination, by exploring how literary and non-literary texts shape perceptions of the world and enable us to enter the worlds of others
- critical exploration of ways in which literary and non-literary texts may reflect or challenge social and cultural ways of thinking and influence audiences
- empathy for others and appreciation of different perspectives through studying a range of literary and non-literary texts from diverse cultures and periods, including Australian texts by Aboriginal writers and/or Torres Strait Islander writers.
Pathways
A course of study in English promotes open-mindedness, imagination, critical awareness and intellectual flexibility — skills that prepare students for local and global citizenship, and for lifelong learning across a wide range of contexts.
Objectives
- By the conclusion of the course of study, students will:
- use patterns and conventions of genres to achieve particular purposes in cultural contexts and social situations
- establish and maintain roles of the writer/speaker/designer and relationships with audiences
- create and analyse perspectives and representations of concepts, identities, times and places
- make use of and analyse the ways cultural assumptions, attitudes, values and beliefs underpin texts and invite audiences to take up positions
- use aesthetic features and stylistic devices to achieve purposes and analyse their effects in texts
- select and synthesise subject matter to support perspectives
- organise and sequence subject matter to achieve particular purposes
- use cohesive devices to emphasise ideas and connect parts of texts
- make language choices for particular purposes and contexts
- use grammar and language structures for particular purposes
- use mode-appropriate features to achieve particular purposes.
Structure
Perspectives and texts- Texts in contexts
- Language and textual analysis
- Responding to and creating texts
| Texts and culture- Texts in contexts
- Language and textual analysis
- Responding to and creating texts
| Textual connections- Conversations about issues in texts
- Conversations about concepts in texts
| Close study of literary texts - Creative responses to literary texts
- Critical responses to literary texts
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Assessment
Schools devise assessments in Units 1 and 2 to suit their local context.
In Units 3 and 4 students complete four summative assessments. The results from each of the assessments are added together to provide a subject score out of 100. Students will also receive an overall subject result (A–E).
Summative assessments
Unit 3
| Unit 4
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Summative internal assessment 1 (IA1):- Spoken persuasive response
| 25%
| Summative internal assessment 3 (IA3):- Examination - extended response
| 25% |
Summative internal assessment 2 (IA2):- Written response for a public audience
| 25%
| Summative external assessment (EA):- Examination - extended response
| 25%
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Year 11/12 Essential English - Applied Senior Subject
The subject Essential English develops and refines students’ understanding of language, literature and literacy to enable them to interact confidently and effectively with others in everyday, community and social contexts. The subject encourages students to recognise language and texts as relevant in their lives now and in the future and enables them to understand, accept or challenge the values and attitudes in these texts.
Students have opportunities to engage with language and texts through a range of teaching and learning experiences to foster:
- skills to communicate confidently and effectively in Standard Australian English in a variety of contemporary contexts and social situations, including everyday, social, community, further education and work-related contexts
- skills to choose generic structures, language, language features and technologies to best convey meaning
- skills to read for meaning and purpose, and to use, critique and appreciate a range of contemporary literary and non-literary texts
- effective use of language to produce texts for a variety of purposes and audiences
- creative and imaginative thinking to explore their own world and the worlds of others
- active and critical interaction with a range of texts, and an awareness of how language positions both them and others
- empathy for others and appreciation of different perspectives through a study of a range of texts from diverse cultures, including Australian texts by Aboriginal writers and/or Torres Strait Islander writers
- enjoyment of contemporary literary and non-literary texts, including digital texts.
Pathways
A course of study in Essential English promotes open-mindedness, imagination, critical awareness and intellectual flexibility — skills that prepare students for local and global citizenship, and for lifelong learning across a wide range of contexts.
Objectives
By the conclusion of the course of study, students will:
- use patterns and conventions of genres to suit particular purposes and audiences
- use appropriate roles and relationships with audiences
- construct and explain representations of identities, places, events and/or concepts
- make use of and explain opinions and/or ideas in texts, according to purpose
- explain how language features and text structures shape meaning and invite particular responses
- select and use subject matter to support perspectives
- sequence subject matter and use mode-appropriate cohesive devices to construct coherent texts
- make language choices according to register informed by purpose, audience and context
- use mode-appropriate language features to achieve particular purposes across modes
Structure
Language that works- Responding to texts
- Creating texts
| Texts and human experiences - Responding to texts
- Creating texts
| Language that influences- Creating and shaping perspectives on community, local and global issues in texts
- Responding to texts that seek to influence audiences
| Representations and popular culture texts- Responding to popular culture texts
- Creating representations of Australian identifies, places, events and concepts
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Assessment
Schools devise assessments in Units 1 and 2 to suit their local context.
In Units 3 and 4 students complete four summative assessments. Schools develop three summative internal assessments and the common internal assessment (CIA) is developed by the QCAA.
Summative assessments
| Summative internal assessment 1 (IA1): | Summative internal assessment 3 (IA3): |
Summative internal assessment 2 (IA2):- Common internal assessment (CIA)
| Summative internal assessment (IA4): |