Planning

The timing of teaching and learning of the VCE English Language Study Design is a matter for schools and teachers. It is important, however, to note that each unit involves at least 50 hours of scheduled classroom instruction over the duration of a semester. Teachers are encouraged to reflect on the competing school commitments such as camps, excursions, sports days and cultural celebrations as they plan each semester’s work and assessments.

Each unit has two areas of study but each may not require an equal allocation of time. Allowing time for students to understand content, and develop and refine skills is essential for success. When students are required to sit examinations, it is wise to allow time for revision, as content completed in February is potentially examinable in November. Students will have continued developing their thinking, reading, viewing and writing skills but may need revision classes on content to reassure themselves that they can apply their enhanced skills in the examination.

Outcomes and school-assessed Coursework (SACs) should be completed in line with the completion of the area of study. Schools need to provide these dates to students in advance and offer students adequate notice if dates change. Teachers should use these published dates to plan individual marking and cross-marking meetings, so that feedback can be provided to students in a timely manner, thereby supporting their ongoing learning in this subject.

Each area of study is designed to build thinking, reading, viewing and writing skills and there is an expectation of skill transference across the whole study design. In some cases, the connections between the skills will be evident – such as the capacity to use linguistic metalanguage across all areas of study and in all assessment tasks. We would encourage teachers to make these connections with their students and to resist offering each area of study as a discreet set of skills, specific only to that knowledge and that assessment task.

The language modes

The language modes are key to developing communication skills that have breadth and depth. They have a central place in the Victorian Curriculum F–10: English, which continues into the VCE. In the context of VCE English Language, students must develop and refine their skills across all the language modes and should be given opportunities to demonstrate those skills through assessment tasks.

The subsystems of language

The subsystems of language offer the linguistic framework for the work students are to complete throughout the study. Students need to have substantial exposure to each subsystem and should be able to engage with them in their analysis of text. The VCE English Language Study Design (2024) defines each of the subsystems and groups metalanguage by subsystem to align with each unit.

Linguistic theories

While there are linguistic theories that are material to the content students will engage with through their study of VCE English Language, teachers should consider the place of linguistic theories in key knowledge across the units and the definitions of the key linguistic theories provided in the study design (pages 15–21). It is important teachers provide appropriate engagement with linguistic theories but, to be successful in the study, students are not required to develop tertiary level understanding of the concepts.

Linguistic metalanguage

VCE English Language has always provided metalanguage lists to guide teachers and students. In the VCE English Language Study Design (2024), the key linguistic metalanguage list includes definitions. These definitions are for the purposes of the study only. It is important to note that many of these concepts are contested at the tertiary level but, for this secondary study, we have clearly defined each term to create certainty for the examination. In addition, each key term from the metalanguage list is mapped to each unit.

Teachers should plan to create a text-rich classroom. This planning should be based on a broad and flexible understanding of what makes a ‘text’ in the context of VCE English Language.

Teachers should consider texts including academic writing, public documents, personal exchanges (text messages, phone calls, domestic interactions), interviews, speeches and spoken public and private exchanges (transcripts), advertising and marketing, literature and storytelling, manuals and technical documents, newspaper reports and opinion pieces, and social media.

Students should:

• read, view and listen to a wide variety of texts, including written, spoken and multimodal texts
• be exposed to texts about language, including linguistic theory
• explore texts for analysis of language use
• engage with contemporary and historical texts
• be exposed to contemporary texts that are updated regularly
• be encouraged to bring texts into class
• have adequate access to the studied texts.

• 2024 English Language Resources

VCE English Language general resources - State Library of Victoria

These resources have been curated by the State Library of Victoria in conjunction with the VCAA to support teachers in delivery Unit 3 and 4 VCE English Language.

Students should be encouraged to recognise their inherent capacity to comment on aspects of the human experience and the value of their knowing, understanding and considering the world around them. Part of this development will be for students to recognise and build their agency in society, and place value on their individual and unique voice. This sense of voice and agency is not limited to one section of the study. It is vital that students build and value their explorations and understandings of texts in a respectful environment. Ultimately all students should have the opportunity to ‘find their voice’ in VCE English Language classrooms.

Ethical scholarship means that students are supported in the production of work that is honest, reliable and credible. This means that they are clear with their reader or audience about what work is their own, and that they acknowledge when other sources are used.
Ethical scholarship requires that students understand and honour the following:

• Honesty – students indicate clearly the work that is their own and the work that is someone else’s.
• Transparency – when quoting another author / expert from their research, students must do so accurately and cite each source used.
• Action – producing work for teacher assessment and feedback allows students to communicate their learning in their own words, and is both a right and a responsibility.

Each student deserves to be acknowledged and credited for their work. However, no student should be acknowledged or credited for work that is not their own including the work of peers and teachers.

Claiming credit for the work of others is known as plagiarism.

Plagiarism is using other person’s work or words without any acknowledgement of that source.

The VCAA publishes guidelines to mitigate against plagiarism in the VCAA VCE Administrative Handbook.

• Scored assessment: School-based Assessment (1.1, 1.2 and 1.4)

Breaches in rules and regulation and / or identification of plagiarism are considered serious by the VCAA. Information is the VCAA VCE Administrative Handbook can guide schools and teachers to address any breaches.

• School-based Assessment: Breaches of rules and investigations (Section 10)

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Perspectives in the VCE
On-demand video recordings, presented with the Victorian Aboriginal Education Association Inc. (VAEAI) and the Department of Education (DE) Koorie Outcomes Division, for VCE teachers and leaders as part of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Perspectives in the VCE webinar program held in 2023.

Students learn that language is a system of signs and conventions and are introduced to the subsystems of language. In studying the various subsystems of language – morphology, lexicology, syntax and semantics – students understand the nature and functions of words, their component parts, how they are used in sentences and how they are associated with the meanings. While students are studying the differences between the modes of spoken and written, they are introduced to the aspects of discourse pertaining to phonetics and phonology and discourse and pragmatics, particularly prosodics and paralinguistic features.

The nature and functions of language

Students explore what language means and how it makes human communication unique while achieving its various functions in a range of Australian and other contexts. In studying the nature of language, students understand how language choices are influenced by a range of factors – function, register, tenor and situational and cultural contexts. They focus on studying the language modes of writing and speaking.

Planning to teach the subsystems of language

Phonetics and Phonology: students are introduced to the different ways in which the vowel and consonant sounds are produced and the symbols for transcribing these sounds. Students are also introduced to connected speech processes and prosodic features.

Morphology: students learn the ways in which words are structured by differentiating between the root morphemes and the various affixes.

Lexicology: students learn about the word classes. Students learn the difference between content and function words. Students are shown how these word classes perform various roles and how they relate to each other (for example, a noun group may include a determiner, an adjective and a noun). They are also shown how they take various forms (for example, nouns can have a possessive form to show number, verbs inflect to indicate tense, adjectives inflect to grade the quality of the noun and the various ways in which adverbs inflect). The subclass of verbs, auxiliary and modal verbs, are also introduced. The function words (pronouns, prepositions, conjunctions, determiners and interjections) are introduced so that students can see how each of these grammatically and structurally relate to the content words to make meaning.

Syntax: students learn about the difference between phrases and clauses. They are shown how each of the content words can have its own group of words to form a phrase (for example, noun phrase, adjective phrase, verb phrase and adverb phrase) as well as how the function word preposition also has its own group of words to form a prepositional phrase. They are shown the properties of clauses and how they contain various clause elements (subject, object, predicate, complement, adverbial) allowing them to make links to their study of word classes, particularly how the conjunctions (coordinating and subordinating) work to combine the clauses to form the various sentence structures (the compound, complex and complex-compound sentences). Along with this they are also introduced to the simple sentence structure and sentence fragments. While introducing the ways in which these clause elements are combined to form sentences, students also learn the significance of word order in English syntax. A discussion of the communicative functions of various sentence types (declarative, interrogative, imperative and exclamative) is also included.

Semantics: students learn about the relationship between a word and its meaning. They are shown how this relationship may be arbitrary and how it is governed by conventions and informed by accepted systems. They are also shown how words can be grouped with other words that have interrelated meanings when they are introduced to the semantic domain. Students are also introduced to inference to show how language users draw on their existing knowledge to make meaning of what is said and what is meant. Students are shown how sometimes these inferences go beyond the accepted use when semantic over-generalisation occurs, particularly when children acquire language.

Discourse and pragmatics: students learn about the differences between the spoken and written mode, and features such as paralinguistics and prosodics that convey not only meaning but also mood and emotions. Code-switching that occurs in an interaction is introduced to highlight their importance in marking the group identities or membership or solidarity of the language user, be it in the spoken or written mode, and reaffirming their social and / or cultural background to their audience.

These features play an important role in the spoken mode, which is the focus in Unit 1. Students will learn about discourse and pragmatics as they relate to the written language mode, and further explore their role in the spoken language mode in Unit 3.

Possible schedule for Area of Study 1: The nature and functions of language

Linguistic theory

• In studying the developmental stages of language acquisition, students should be introduced to key theories often used to explain the key elements of language development. In order to keep the study of language acquisition manageable, this study focuses on an examination of Usage Based Accounts and Universal Grammar. Teachers should provide students with opportunities to explore these theories in practical tasks, linking them to an understanding of phonological and grammatical linguistic development in first and additional language learners.
• In engaging with the study of Universal Grammar and Usage Based Accounts, students should apply a range of critical thinking concepts to explore the origins, rationale and key features of each linguistic theory. Using a range of Project Zero thinking tools to critically evaluate theories could support students to develop academic evaluation skills. This encourages students to become active contributors to linguistic debates, rather than passive consumers of others’ viewpoints.

First and additional language learning and multilingualism

• It is important for students to explore language learning from a range of origin points – not merely the acquisition of first language by children. The requirement to explore first and additional language learning, and to examine the nature of multilingualism, is an important stepping stone to the deeper discussion of language and identity in Unit 4.
• Teachers can support students to compare and contrast the functions of language learning in various contexts and stages, in turn highlighting the evidence to support or contradict various linguistic theories mentioned above.

Case studies and fieldwork

Processes and purposes of fieldwork

• Exposing students to the process of linguistic fieldwork allows them real-life and authentic learning experiences in order to enrich their understandings of the nature of language and its acquisition.
• Linguistic fieldwork describes the process of collecting accurate data related to specific language use in the field to examine the nature of language use in a specific context and / or by a specific cohort of language users.
• Fieldwork is intended to support analysis and evaluation of hypotheses related to specific linguistic theories through the provision of real-life data.
• Students may collect and analyse a range of data in their fieldwork experiences.
• Observational notes
• Phonetic transcriptions
• Interview and survey data
• Recordings
• Samples of oral and written language
• Where primary fieldwork is not possible, teachers could supply secondary data to students for analysis to provide experience in linguistic investigation and fieldwork.
• Samples of child language

Ethical considerations in fieldwork

• As part of this study, teachers and students may be involved fieldwork that involves human subjects. Teachers and schools have a legal and moral responsibility to ensure that students always demonstrate ethical conduct when undertaking such activities.
• When conducting fieldwork which involves human subjects, consent is required from anyone from whom data is collected.
• If subjects are children, parental consent must be obtained.
• If data is to be collected on site at an educational institution (early childhood or school setting), then the principal or operator must also provide consent.
• Information must be provided about the nature and purpose of data collected, and how privacy and safety will be ensured.
• Ethics approval is not required where fieldwork is being conducted by students within their own or neighbouring education providers, provided Principal consent has been obtained.

Transcribing fieldwork

• Oral language can be transcribed phonemically or phonetically. Phonemic transcription does not distinguish differences or errors in pronunciation, and therefore is of limited use in transcribing speech being investigated in relation to language acquisition, where variations in pronunciation could be significant. Therefore, for the purposes of this area of study, the use of phonetic transcription should be prioritised.
• Phonetic transcription makes use of the International Phonetic Alphabet to accurately record the actual pronunciation of all speech sounds. Students need to be familiar with the IPA, as well as the most common transcription symbols to represent prosody and paralinguistics.

Possible schedule for Area of Study 2: Language acquisition

Key events and concepts for development of English

• The study of the development of English necessitates both a chronological and conceptual examination of elements of human history. Students should be exposed to the earliest known origins of human language and the chronological journey to what we know as Modern English, while also exploring key technological and socio-political concepts which influenced this chronological change and consolidation.
•  To explore the breadth of language change, teachers should provide diverse texts for student consideration, allowing for integration of all key events and time periods within and alongside the selected elective option for study.

Similarities and differences of elective options

• The Incursions elective option layers a socio-political lens over the study of language change over time. Teachers should offer students a range of language examples from each incursion mentioned, encouraging comparison and analysis against the subsystems and discussion about how socio-political factors have influenced English language development.
• In contrast, the Inventions elective option layers a technological lens over language development. Students should be afforded opportunities to explore the key linguistic features evident from each successive invention, and the factors which led to these changes.
• Regardless of the elective option selected, teachers should plan a learning sequence which allows students to experience the breadth and depth of language development before delving more deeply into detailed examination of the chosen elective option.

Key factors of each elective option

• Incursions:
• This elective offers two events that are effectively fixed (the Vikings and the Norman conquest) and two concepts that are inherently flexible (religion and plagues). The last two provides teachers and students with agency to make choices about events that map to these areas that would best fit their cohort.
• In religion, teachers and students could consider one of the following.
• Christianity and the impact of Latin
• Protestantism and the King James Bible
• The following sites might be useful.
• History Extra
• BBC
• Historic UK
• The Guardian
• British History
• Latin in Medieval Britain
• The British Library – The King James Bible
• In plagues, teachers and students could consider one of the following.
• The Black Death
• COVID-19
• The following sites might be useful.
• Hektoen International
• History Extra
• To be completed individually or in groups, a short investigative report into the selected key events to share with the class and to create a knowledge base. There are a number of online resources that can be used for these projects.
• A range of texts from Early, Middle and Modern English can be found here.
• There are a number of considerations when investigating the incursions which contributed to English language development. Language change can be wrought by a range of influences, all of which will impact language differently. Students should be encouraged to consider how social hierarchy, socio-political and socio-economic factors contribute to language change, and how this is reflected in the nature of change, most particularly in the incursion’s contribution to specific semantic fields.
• Inventions
• When considering how inventions have shaped language development, students should be given the opportunity to explore a range of texts constructed from various eras linked to the inventions. Students could, for example, explore the standardisation of spelling brought about by the printing press and dictionaries, and then the impact that digital processing tools have had on linguistic innovation.
• The Inventions elective option allows teachers and students to focus on the technological influences on language change, and how these enhance and constrain linguistic innovation. Learning experiences in this option can focus on the context of the invention – their drivers and constraints – and the subsequent impact on the English Language both in terms of relevant subsystem changes, but also the broader socio-political impacts to which they contributed.
• The following sites might be useful.
• Dictionary.com
• My English Language
• The Machine that Made Us
• World History
• The Oxford English Dictionary
• The British Library
• David Crystal – The British Library
• The Age of the Dictionary
• The Guardian

Possible schedule for Area of Study 1: English across time

Key considerations in selecting content

Students will benefit from reading about the development of the English language to understand the various factors that contributed to its growth and spread. Select articles or books written by leading linguists (for example, David Crystal’s The Cambridge Encyclopedia of English Language) or experts on how English has developed over the last millennia and has spread globally.

Students must be introduced to authentic texts written in a range of national, regional and ethnic varieties of English that are produced in their respective countries where this variety is spoken or written. Source a range of international magazines written in various national varieties of English (Local Council libraries may have access to international magazines in print or provide access to apps like Press Reader) to identify authentic texts to study the unique characteristics of a range of national varieties. These texts can be used to gain more insights into how language encodes social and cultural identities and reflects the worldviews of its users. The English based varieties can range from pidgins to standardised varieties (for example, Singlish to Standard Singaporean English or Tanglish to Indian English).

To appreciate the characteristics of the varieties of English, expose students to careful analysis of how each variety of English developed from its first contact, and how they display both the characteristic features unique to their first language and aspects of Standard English. Acquire research articles or books, if possible, on the varieties of English. Leading publishers in this field have articles and / or books on specific varieties of English that provide a close analysis of the various characteristics of varieties of English, including Australian English and ethnolects.

Teachers can use the opportunity to identify the varieties of English that may be spoken by their student cohort. Students will gain from listening to the pronunciation and accents of a range of varieties, for example, by accessing some of the audio clips from Macquarie University’s website. They can be encouraged to record their own accents to study the influence of their first language on their English varieties that they speak.

To help students understand how languages can be quickly lost and the many challenges in reviving a language, teachers can collect and share articles on efforts taken to reclaim Indigenous languages in Australia.

Possible schedule for Area of Study 2: Englishes in contact

While the two areas of study are presented separately, they are two ends of a continuum, rather than binary opposites. In that regard, it can be beneficial to students to show how texts can fit along the continuum, and also how texts can shift their registers. Both written and spoken texts can be found at either end of the continuum, although it is more likely that formal texts will tend towards the written mode and informal texts will tend towards the spoken mode.

There are arguments for starting with either area of study. Starting with Outcome 1: Informality can often engage students, as informal language is the language that they are familiar with. Starting with Outcome 2: Formality can give students structures for writing formally that they can apply in their own work.

Students need a strong understanding of the metalanguage used to analyse language in both outcomes. It is important to point out to students, however, that no single language feature on its own creates a particular register. Rather, students must consider the context of the text, and how combinations of language features are used within that context to achieve a register, or to move between registers. When choosing texts for analysis, it is worth selecting those that have one distinct register for assessment, so that students can clearly show their understanding of that register.

When planning to teach each area of study, it is worth starting with concrete metalanguage before moving on to broader ideas around purpose and intent. That way, students have the content knowledge to apply to the bigger ideas.

Spoken language is quite relevant in looking at informality. Students should be provided with transcripts of various spoken texts, such as:

• radio broadcasts (breakfast and drivetime radio, in particular)
• Radio National
• television interviews
• podcasts

as well as given the opportunity to transcribe their own conversations for use.

Prosody and paralinguistic features can be analysed in some depth in an informal spoken text, as can the range of spoken discourse features and strategies. The various types of semantic and phonological patterning are often used for effect in informal spoken and written texts. Informal written texts can come from:

• social media
• blogs
• recipe blogs
• Junkee
• Pedestrian
  
• websites aimed at young people, such as the Triple J website.

The metalanguage of lexicology, syntax, and discourse is highly relevant in this outcome. In particular, in relation to formal language, students can effectively analyse features such as word classes, nominalisation, modality, sentence types and structures, active and passive voice, and coherence and cohesion.

Formal written texts can include:

• terms of service or terms and conditions
• rules and instructions
• informative texts found on government websites.

Formal spoken texts are more likely to be speeches than dialogues, and can include:

• Remembrance Day/ANZAC Day speeches
• memorials or eulogies
• ceremonial presentations.

Template for planning

The two areas of study are interlinked closely because cultural identity is a large facet of each. It is beneficial to warn students of the fact that a lot of what we perceive as ‘language of a particular identity’ can be based on stereotypes rather than fact. Ensuring they have this critical eye will assist them in developing content and analysis that speaks to the individual rather than broader misconceptions. Encourage students to access language and identity that is relevant and consistent in their day-to-day lives to allow for authenticity and interest.

The historical context of Australian English is a good starting point; however, encourage students not to get bogged down in ‘dates and events’, and to rather focus on the cultural mythos that informs the language we use today. Encourage students to use the metalanguage they secured in the Unit 3 study of informal language, notably when discussing group language and membership.

Historical context is relevant when looking at the notion of Australian English. Encourage students to broaden their perceptions of ‘one Australian English’ and to instead perceive the countless varieties as all relevant and valid demonstrations of what Australian English can and does look like.

• Starting points can be what students traditionally perceive as ‘Australian English’, including folklore texts such as ‘Waltzing Matilda’ and access to short segments of documentaries such as Melvin Bragg’s the adventures of English.
• Tying these texts to contemporary usage such as news headlines, footy commentary and public figures can be a measure of what features persist and evolve within our identity.
• Encourage students to critically think about what we perceive as ‘Australian values’ and how these manifest in our broader cultural mythos and subsequent language. For example, the concept of the ‘fair go’, and how this can be seen in our valued colloquial language and is embodied (or not) in elements of our society.
• Providing a range of text types in this area of study is critical to preparing for the examination and analysis of text types. Spoken examples can be transcribed from pop culture.

When accessing varieties of Australian English, ask students to explore their own context (ethnolects at home, AAE on Instagram) to see how these varieties use various platforms for the sharing and promotion of varieties of Australian English. Texts in these varieties can include:

• SBS language services – minipods
• Poetry and literature using Aboriginal English or ethnolects
• Ethnolects in popular culture (in transcripts) 
• Aboriginal English in mainstream media and pop culture.

Exploration of individual and group identity should be an extension of Area of Study 1, whereby students are looking more broadly at other facets of language and identity. It is important to encourage students to interrogate the concept of identity and the various ways this can be revealed in language use. Representation of identity and the way language can support feelings about group membership and covert prestige is paramount to this area of study.

Resources and texts demonstrating language and identity can include:

• Studies and explorations of language and identity in terms of gender and or gender identity
• Social media as platforms for building and revealing group identity
• Student’s own peer groups and online platforms that are age or interest based
• Workplace resource and guides for jargon and career-based documentation
• Interviews with family members or peers that showcase differing language usage.

Sample template for planning