Essential English

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.