Subject description

Essential English is a 20-credit subject at Stage 2.

In this subject students respond to and create texts in and for a range of personal, social, cultural, community, and/or workplace contexts.

Students understand and interpret information, ideas, and perspectives in texts and consider ways in which language choices are used to create meaning.

Capabilities

The capabilities connect student learning within and across subjects in a range of contexts. 

The SACE identifies seven capabilities.

Literacy

Literacy is critical in the development of the skills and strategies needed to express, interpret, and communicate information, ideas, and perspectives. In Essential English literacy skills are developed through a focus on comprehending and creating written, spoken, visual, and digital texts, and using and modifying language for different purposes in a range of social and cultural contexts, including study, work, and community life. Essential English develops an awareness of the sociocultural aspects of language in social, community, workplace, and/or imagined contexts.

Numeracy

Students develop their numeracy skills in this subject as they practise and apply the skills of interpreting and analysing, comparing and contrasting, making connections, posing and proving arguments, making inferences, and problem-solving as they create and respond to a range of texts. They draw conclusions from statistical information, interpret graphic representations of data, use quantitative data as evidence in persuasive texts, and evaluate the use of statistics in media, business, research, and other reports.

Information and communication technology (ICT) capability

There is a focus in Essential English on ICT through the use of digital texts (including social media communication), in personal and professional contexts, and on understanding and creating multimodal texts. Students use digital technologies when they access, manage, and use information, and when they create their own texts. They develop skills in reading, viewing, and responding to digital and multimodal texts, and create texts using different modes and mediums to practise and consolidate their language skills. Students recognise that global communication is enhanced through the use of e-literacy skills and context-appropriate etiquette and expectations.

Critical and creative thinking

Critical and creative thinking is integral to the study and creation of texts in Essential English. Students consider information, ideas, and perspectives presented in texts. In thinking about and creating their own texts, they recognise and develop arguments, use evidence, and draw reasoned conclusions. Students apply critical thinking when they apply their knowledge of language to consider the purpose, context, audience, and language features of a range of texts. They recognise ways in which language is used to present individuals and social and cultural groups. Students experiment with text structures and language features as they transform and adapt texts for different purposes, audiences, and contexts. Creative thinking enables students to apply imaginative and inventive strategies in the creation of their own original works.

Personal and social capability

Students develop their sense of self, and understand their role and place in communities, through the development of their language skills. They develop their personal and social capability in this subject by extending their communication skills, teamwork, and understanding of verbal and non-verbal modes of interaction.

The study of Essential English helps students to understand different personal and social experiences, perspectives, and challenges. Students identify and express their own opinions, information, ideas, and responses by interacting with a range of texts and situations. Students learn through working and researching independently and collaboratively.

Essential English assists students in the development of communication skills needed for conversation, research, presentations, and the expression of viewpoints and arguments. They develop empathy with and appreciation of the perspectives of others. 

Ethical understanding

Ethical understanding is explored in Essential English through the selection of texts for study, for example, when students engage with ethical dilemmas presented in texts, and consider reasons for actions and the implications of decisions. They explore and question information, ideas, and perspectives in texts, examining how they are presented, their impact on audiences, and how they are reflected in students’ own responses. Through the study of Essential English, students come to appreciate and develop greater empathy for the rights and opinions of others. They develop increasingly advanced communication, research, and presentation skills to express viewpoints. Students develop an understanding of the importance of acknowledging the opinions, ideas, and perspectives of others through appropriate referencing.

Intercultural understanding

Intercultural understanding in Essential English develops an intercultural capability that includes an understanding of diversity and difference, and openness to different perspectives and experiences which, in turn, develop world-mindedness, respect for the rights of others, and a sense of global citizenship.

Through the study of contemporary and past texts, and texts from diverse cultures, students explore these connections. Students understand and can express the interdependence of language, culture, and identity and are able to appreciate and empathise with the cultural perspectives and values of others. They study how cultural concepts, beliefs, practices, and perspectives are represented in a range of textual forms and for a variety of purposes and audiences. Intercultural understanding is enhanced by developing intercultural communication skills and an understanding of international etiquette. 

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander knowledge, cultures, and perspectives

In partnership with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, and schools and school sectors, the SACE Board of South Australia supports the development of high-quality learning and assessment design that respects the diverse knowledge, cultures, and perspectives of Indigenous Australians.

The SACE Board encourages teachers to include Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander knowledge and perspectives in the design, delivery, and assessment of teaching and learning programs by:

• providing opportunities in SACE subjects for students to learn about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories, cultures, and contemporary experiences
• recognising and respecting the significant contribution of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples to Australian society
• drawing students’ attention to the value of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander knowledge and perspectives from the past and the present
• promoting the use of culturally appropriate protocols when engaging with and learning from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and communities.  

SACE literacy requirement

Students who complete 20 credits of Stage 2 Essential English with a C– grade or better will meet the literacy requirement of the SACE.  

Learning requirements

The learning requirements summarise the knowledge, skills, and understanding that students are expected to develop and demonstrate through their learning in Stage 2 Essential English.

In this subject, students are expected to:

1. extend communication skills through reading, viewing, writing, listening, and speaking
2. consider and respond to information, ideas, and perspectives in texts selected from social, cultural, community, workplace, and/or imaginative contexts
3. examine the effect of language choices, conventions, and stylistic features in a range of texts for different audiences
4. analyse the role of language in supporting effective communication
5. create oral, written, and multimodal texts that communicate information, ideas, and perspectives for a range of purposes.

Responding to Texts

Students respond to a range of texts that instruct, engage, challenge, inform, and connect readers. They consider information, ideas, and perspectives represented in the chosen texts.

Texts for this study will have a direct connection with the chosen context. Students could, for example, be involved in, or be a member of a:

• volunteer organisation
• workplace
• group from a culturally and linguistically diverse background
• social networking community
• school-based special-interest group
• group of students for whom English is a second or additional language.

Teachers choose texts relevant to one or more of these contexts. The reading of these texts clarifies and extends students’ comprehension of the processes, issues, or concerns of individuals or communities.

Students may explore the different points of view presented in a text by analysing content, attitudes, stylistic features, and language features. Students reflect on ways in which texts may be interpreted through identifying the effect of language choice.

Students consider how perspectives are represented in texts to influence specific audiences. For some texts students have an opportunity to identify facts, opinions, supporting evidence, and bias. In addition, students may consider how some points of view are privileged while others are marginalised or silenced.

Students reflect on ways in which community, local, or global issues and ideas are presented in texts; they develop reasoned responses to these issues and ideas. Students develop independent points of view by synthesising information from a range of sources.

In reflecting on, and possibly participating in, discussions and community debates, students have opportunities to develop understanding and appreciation of the diversity of cultures, including Indigenous cultures.

Creating Texts

Students create procedural, imaginative, analytical, interpretive, or persuasive texts appropriate to a context.

To create some texts it will be necessary for students to gather different points of view, for example, through interviews, surveys, questionnaires, and Internet resources. For these texts it will be important for students to determine the relevance of source material to context and topic.

Students learn that authors observe various conventions of style, content, vocabulary, register, and format, and that some authors ignore or deliberately challenge these conventions. Students should be aware of the stylistic features and textual conventions of various forms.

When creating their own procedural, imaginative, analytical, persuasive, and/or interpretive texts, students are encouraged to consider the intended purpose of the text, the representation of ideas and issues, and the possible response of the audience.

Students create a persuasive text that advocates for an issue, cause, or process relevant to a context in which the student is living, studying, and/or working.

Students extend their literacy skills to equip them for work, future learning, and participation in civic life. They develop appropriate vocabulary and use accurate spelling, punctuation, and grammar. Students use strategies for planning, drafting, revising, editing, and proofreading, and, where necessary, appropriate referencing.

Hearing impaired and/or speech-impaired students can use alternative means of communication, such as signing or the use of appropriate technology, for the oral modes. 

Language study

The language study focuses on the use of language by people in a context outside of the classroom.

Students select one of the following contexts for study:

• workplace, training or volunteering
• virtual social networking
• a recreational or personal interest (e.g. sport, reading)
• educational/academic (e.g. school)
• cultural (e.g. language group, festival)
• the local community
• a community of interest.

They need to consider the practical and ethical implications of communicating effectively and appropriately.

Students consider the use of language in their chosen context, including the communication of information, ideas, and perspectives. Students examine ways in which language, in conjunction with, for example, ethnicity, gender identity, social and economic status, and age, is used to support communication and the formation and maintenance of personal and group identity. 

Students reflect on the strategies and language used to communicate in a specific context.  

The language study could also explore ways in which people change or modify their use of language according to context, purpose, or audience expectation.

Evidence of learning

All Stage 2 subjects have a school assessment component and an external assessment component.

The following assessment types enable students to demonstrate their learning in Stage 2 Essential English:

School assessment (70%)

• Assessment Type 1: Responding to Texts (30%)
• Assessment Type 2: Creating Texts (40%)

External assessment (30%)

• Assessment Type 3: Language Study (30%)

Students provide evidence of their learning through seven assessments, including the external assessment component. Students complete:

• three assessments for responding to texts
• three assessments for creating texts
• one language study. 

Assessment design criteria

The assessment design criteria are based on the learning requirements and are used by:

• teachers to clarify for the student what they need to learn
• teachers and assessors to design opportunities for the student to provide evidence of their learning at the highest possible level of achievement.

The assessment design criteria consist of specific features that:

• students should demonstrate in their learning
• teachers and assessors look for as evidence that students have met the learning requirements.

For this subject, the assessment design criteria are:

• communication
• comprehension
• analysis
• application.

The specific features of these criteria are described below.

The set of assessments, as a whole, must give students opportunities to demonstrate each of the specific features by the completion of study of the subject.

Communication

The specific features are as follows:

Comprehension

The specific features are as follows:

Analysis

The specific features are as follows:

Application

The specific features are as follows:

School assessment

The school assessment component for Stage 2 Essential English consists of 2 assessment types:

• Assessment Type 1: Responding to Texts
• Assessment Type 2: Creating Texts.

Assessment Type 1: Responding to Texts (30%)

Students produce three responses to texts. At least one of the responses must be produced in written form, and at least one response in oral or multimodal form.

A written response should be a maximum of 800 words; an oral response should be a maximum of
5 minutes; a response in multimodal form should be of equivalent length.

Texts for study should be selected from at least two of the following text types or purposes:

• a workplace text (i.e. one dealing with a vocational process or issue)
• an advocacy text (i.e. one that seeks to change attitudes or actions)
• a biographical text
• a narrative text
• an imaginative text
• a social media text
• a non-fiction text
• a prose text (or extract)
• a speech or oral presentation (e.g. a motivational speech by a sports coach)
• a visual text
• a media text
• a dramatic text
• a poetry text.

Responses to texts could include, but are not limited to:

• an evaluation of a section of a workplace text
• an oral presentation with visual images
• comments on a section of a film text (i.e. director’s commentary)
• an essay
• a web page
• a monologue
• a role play.

For this assessment type, students provide evidence of their learning primarily in relation to the following assessment design criteria:

• communication
• comprehension
• analysis. 

Assessment Type 2: Creating Texts

Students create written, oral, and multimodal texts for procedural, imaginative, analytical, persuasive, and/or interpretive purposes.

Students create:

• one advocacy text
• two additional texts.

At least one of the responses must be in written form, and at least one in oral or multimodal form.

A written text should be a maximum of 800 words; an oral response should be a maximum of 5 minutes; a text in multimodal form should be of equivalent length.

Advocacy text

Students produce at least one text that advocates for an issue, cause, or process relevant to a context. Students could, for example, create a text advocating for:

• an improved process or procedure in a workplace
• a change to a rule or process in a sporting context
• ethical treatment of an individual or group of individuals
• provision of a service or infrastructure in a local community
• action to encourage or prevent change within a community.

Additional texts

The two additional texts should be different from each other and from the advocacy text in purpose, audience, and/or context. For the additional texts students could, for example, create:

• a description of a process or an event
• an imaginative narrative linked to a concern or an issue
• a signed presentation (and deliver it)
• a play script, or create and perform a monologue exploring the emotions or thoughts of an individual
• a workplace text (e.g. an accident report or a recommendation to change a process)
• a description of a place, an emotion, or an online space
• a speech to be given at a workplace, a sports event, a social gathering, or a formal event
• a poem or song that explores an issue, an emotion, or a memory
• a digital text such as a series of web pages based on a subject that is linked to a particular context
• a personal letter to explain and justify a point of view
• a newspaper or magazine article that describes a social, political, or sporting event
• a series of web pages explaining the steps involved in a workplace or sporting process
• an interactive digital children’s story
• a multimedia display to educate a target group about a community issue.

For this assessment type, students provide evidence of their learning primarily in relation to the following assessment design criteria:

• communication
• application. 

External assessment

The external assessment component for Stage 2 Essential English consists of an independent language study.

Assessment Type 3: Language Study (30%) 

For this assessment type, students complete an independent language study. The focus of study is an understanding of the use of spoken, non-verbal, visual, and/or written language by people in a chosen context beyond the classroom.

Although this is an independent study, teachers may advise and support students in choosing a focus for study as well as to provide a structure for the completion of the study. Teachers may select the context for the class and prepare students with formative activities, or students may choose their own contexts. Students must undertake this study as an individual and not as a shared exercise. Students, in consultation with their teacher, select one of the following contexts for study:

• workplace, training, or volunteering
• virtual social networking
• a recreational or personal interest (e.g. sport, reading)
• educational/academic (e.g. school)
• cultural (e.g. language group, festival)
• the local community
• a community of interest.

Students focus their study through devising a question or hypothesis about the use of language in the chosen context. They select appropriate language resources to analyse and use as evidence in their study. Students use at least two different language resources. These resources should be selected and evaluated for the ways in which they develop the student’s understanding of the use of language in the selected context.

The language study requires for students to analyse how the language in the resources used has contributed to answering the question, or proved or disproved the hypothesis.

The study should include:

• an introduction, describing the context, question, or hypothesis and the selected language resources
• an analysis of the language in the selected resources and the extent to which that supports or answers the question or hypothesis
• evidence from the selected resources that supports the analysis
• a conclusion about the use of language in the chosen context.

The language study should be a maximum of 1500 words if written or 9 minutes if presented in oral form. If presented in multimodal form, the length should be equivalent.

The following specific features of the assessment design criteria for this subject are assessed in the language study:

• communication — C1 and C2
• comprehension — Cp2
• analysis — An1 and An2
• application — Ap1.

Performance standards

The performance standards describe five levels of achievement, A to E. 

Each level of achievement describes the knowledge, skills, and understanding that teachers and assessors refer to in deciding how well students have demonstrated their learning on the basis of the evidence provided. 

During the teaching and learning program the teacher gives students feedback on their learning, with reference to the performance standards.

At the student’s completion of study of each school assessment type, the teacher makes a decision about the quality of the student’s learning by:

• referring to the performance standards
• assigning a grade between A+ and E– for the assessment type.  

The student’s school assessment and external assessment are combined for a final result, which is reported as a grade between A+ and E–.

Performance standards

Stage 2 performance standards for Essential English can be viewed below. You can also download in Word format [DOC 261KB].

To learn more about what performance standards are, how they are used, and other general information, see performance standards and grades.

Glossary

Audience

The group of readers, listeners, or viewers that the writer, designer, film-maker, or speaker is addressing. Audience (real and implied) includes an individual, students in the classroom, the wider community, review writers, and critics.

Context

The environment in which a text is responded to or created. Context can include the general social, historical, and cultural conditions in which a text is responded to and created (the content of culture) or the specific features of its immediate environment (context of situation),

Convention

An accepted practice that has developed over time and is generally used and understood, for example, the use of specific structural aspects of texts, such as in report writing, with sections for introduction, background, discussion, and recommendations.

Language features

The features of language that support meaning (e.g. sentence structure, vocabulary, punctuation, figurative language, framing, camera angles). These choices vary according to the purpose of a text, its subject matter, audience, and communication mode.

Literary text

Literary texts refer to past and present texts across a range of cultural contexts. They are valued for their form and style and are recognised as having enduring or artistic value.

Medium

The resources used in the production of texts, including tools and materials (e.g. digital text and the computer, writing and the pen, typewriter).

Metalanguage

Specialised language used to refer to technical aspects of the study of English, for example, language used to discuss film or literary study (e.g. mise-en-scène, symbolism, characterisation) or language used to talk about grammatical terms (e.g. ‘sentence’, ‘clause’, ‘conjunction’).

Mode

The various processes of communication: listening, speaking, reading/viewing, and writing/creating. Modes are also used to refer to the semiotic (meaning-making) resources associated with these communicative processes (e.g. sound, print, image, gesture).

Multimodal text

Combination of two or more communication modes (e.g. combining print, image, and spoken text in film or computer presentations).

Perspective

The way a reader/viewer is positioned by the author through the text, or how a particular ideology is embedded in a text (e.g. a feminist perspective).

Stylistic features

The ways in which aspects of texts (e.g. words, sentences, images) are arranged and how they affect meaning. Style can distinguish the work of individual authors (e.g. Paul Jennings’s stories, Henry Lawson’s poems) as well as the work of a particular period (e.g. Elizabethan drama), or of a particular genre or text type (e.g. recipes, scientific articles, play-by-play commentary). Examples of stylistic features are narrative viewpoint, structure of stanzas, juxtaposition, nominalisation, alliteration, metaphor, and lexical choice.

Text types

Examples of text types include reports, essays, speeches, narratives, recounts, infographics, films, stories, poems, novels, podcasts. These text types can be further classified according to the particular purposes they are designed to achieve (e.g. informational, imaginative, interpretive, analytical, or persuasive). 

Subject changes

Any changes to this subject will be recorded here.