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English

English

Year 8

In Year 8 students will be studying The Australian Curriculum: English, which is organised into three interrelated strands that support students’ growing understanding and use of Standard Australian English. Together the three strands focus on developing students’ knowledge, understanding and skills in listening, reading, viewing, speaking and writing. The three strands are:

  • Language: knowing about the English language
  • Literature: understanding, appreciating, responding to, analysing and creating literature
  • Literacy: expanding the repertoire of English usage.

The vehicle for studying English is texts and these can be written, spoken or multimodal, and in print or digital/online forms. Texts provide important opportunities for learning about aspects of human experience.

In year eight students will continue to practise, consolidate and extend what they have learned from previous years. They also extend their understanding of how language works and learn to transfer this knowledge to different contexts.

The notion of valuing certain texts as ‘literature’ is introduced. Students learn how such texts can be discussed and analysed in relation to themes, ideas and historical and cultural contexts.

Students engage with a variety of genres and modes. They re-enact, represent and describe texts in order to display their understanding of narrative, theme, purpose, context and argument and to defend their ideas in written and oral modes. Students are given further opportunities to create increasingly sophisticated and multi-modal texts in groups and individually.

Advanced English

The Advanced English course aims to meet the needs of students who excel in their study of English. While this course covers many of the same concepts and on occasion the same texts as the Mainstream English course, the material is covered in greater depth. On occasion students in the Advanced course engage with more complex, and developmentally appropriate, texts that facilitate the extension of students while still meeting the demands of the syllabus. Some assessments are modified making them more challenging while meeting the specific learning needs of the students and better preparing them for the rigour of the senior years.  Students with an innate appreciation of language and reading are most likely to enjoy the challenge this course offers.

Modified English

The Year 8 Modified English Course aims to meet the specific needs of students who are struggling with the literacy and organisational skills necessary to do well in English. This course covers much of the same material and uses mostly the same texts as English, however material is covered at a pace that matches the ability of the students and the number and type of assessments are modified to meet the specific learning needs of the students.