12 Essential English – Australian narratives unit – Characterisation + reading a First Nations story

About the PPT: the lesson began with a checking for understanding brainstorm – students had to think of types of characters who commonly appear in stories. After sharing their responses, I have a list for students to copy. There is information about the types of things authors need to plan and consider before they begin writing. I have a slide defining characterisation which gives examples of direct and indirect characterisation. Following this the text for today’s lesson ‘Soil’ is introduced. I provide some information about the author Ellen Van Neerven who was awarded the 2015 NSW Premier’s Literary Awards Indigenous Writers Prize for the collection ‘Heat and Light’. Some of the terms that students may be unfamiliar with have been defined on the slide. After reading the story, there are some discussion questions which I use with the students. Students then share their responses for the retrieval chart. This is followed by some information provided by one of the Bundjalung teachers from our school about some of the sensitive issues raised in this story. Students then consider what gaps or silences they could draw on in a short story. I located images from children’s picture books and the internet which students could draw on to develop their setting. Following this, students were given a writing prompt which they had to plan for (which they would write about in the literacy lesson). The slides from the literacy lesson are also included.

Other resources:
A copy of the Short Story and the retrieval chart

Context: A lesson designed for use in a 12 Essential English classroom in Queensland, Australia as part of Unit 4: “Representations and popular culture texts - Topic 2: Creating representations of Australian identities, places, events and concepts.” During this unit students learned about Australian social groups. They engaged with a range of short stories representing Australia. Their assessment was to write a short story which explored a gap/silence from one of the texts they studied in class.