English / Year 7 / Language / Expressing and developing ideas

Curriculum content descriptions

Understand how to use spelling rules and word origins, for example Greek and Latin roots, base words, suffixes, prefixes, spelling patterns and generalisations to learn new words and how to spell them (ACELA1539)

General capabilities
  • Literacy Literacy
ScOT terms

Language conventions,  Spelling,  Affixes

Interactive

Syllabus bites: Exploring Asia-related texts

This resource has information, links and study guides on Asia-related texts to support the Australian Curriculum in English for Year 7, 8, 9, 10.

Interactive

Syllabus bites: types of sentences

A web page resource with information, teacher guides and activities on types of sentences to support the Australian Curriculum in English K–10. It has detailed activities, links to resources and quizzes.

Video

Voice of the People: The Aussie Accent: Whaddya reckon, mate?

Imagine a world where everybody sounded exactly the same when they spoke. What might that be like? Are there 'good' and 'bad' ways to speak? In this clip, listen to the opinions of many people about whether Australians have a bad accent.

Video

Learn 60 new vocabulary words with these imaginative student videos

This resource showcases short videos made by students in which they define a Word of the Day in under 15 seconds. Sixty videos are organized into three compilations by part of speech. Use the videos as inspiration for your students to create their own vocabulary-related video. The resource includes an interactive Vocabulary.com ...

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Learn vocabulary all year

Find a schedule of challenges that can help students engage with words and new vocabulary through writing, drawing and video-making, and connect their language study to what they might read in newspapers and observe in their own lives.

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Vocabulary in context

The aim of this resource is to support students to identify and build meaning of words and their affixes. Students will learn to use contextual clues to determine best word choice. The resource includes a list of strategies that may help to build vocabulary. It includes a list organised from most frequently used suffixes ...

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Linguistic Roots and Affixes

This webpage provides examples of examples of Latin affixes, Greek affixes, a list of the 20 most frequently used prefixes, and a list of the 20 most frequently used suffixes. It also includes sone interactive activities for students to test their knowledge.

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Every Word Has a Story

The approach taken in this sequence is to introduce students to the history of the English language and to explore the etymology or origin of English words. Students will be introduced to the meaning of Latin and Greek roots and explore how prefixes and suffixes change word meaning and function. This understanding supports ...

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Work sample Year 7 English: Picture book

This work sample demonstrates evidence of student learning in relation to aspects of the achievement standards for Year 7 English. The primary purpose for the work sample is to demonstrate the standard, so the focus is on what is evident in the sample not how it was created. The sample is an authentic representation of ...

Interactive

Aim to sustain: A world of difference

Students explore what is happening at an individual, community and global level and plan actions they will take. These may range from taking a quiz to sharing knowledge about being 'green' at home, through to planning a conference session to deliver to other students. The resource includes videos, SMART notebooks, worksheets ...

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How to write a ‘how-to’

In this step-by-step guide, students will learn about the “how to” genre with examples drawn from the New York Times. They will use writing prompts to come up with a task they’d like to explain; find and interview an expert; then edit what they have into a clear and interesting explanation.

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142 Picture Prompts to Inspire Student Writing

Find a year’s worth of short, accessible, image-driven posts that invite a variety of kinds of writing.

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Sentence combining

Sentence combining is an instructional technique used to improve sentence quality, complexity and variety. Students are taught how to combine two or more basic sentences to create more interesting, sophisticated and varied sentences. When sentence combining is taught explicitly and in a sustained way, it becomes one component ...

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Compound sentences

This guide provides clear grammatical definitions, and unpacks the features of compound sentences and how they function. It includes information about using conjunctions; coordinating conjunctions; using semicolons and common problems with compound sentences. The guide also offers, as a starting point, some strategies for ...

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Punctuation – What’s the point

This practice guide offers an overview of essential punctuation for writing across primary and secondary school. While an effective combination of sentence types adds depth and variety to a piece of writing, correct punctuation is equally vital for clarity and coherence. This guide aims to provide clear examples to support ...

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Complex sentences: Creating agility and depth in your writing

Complex sentences are an important step in enabling students to produce more sophisticated writing. Mastering complex sentences allows students to have greater control when communicating. This resource provides information about topics such as Dependent clauses, Nominalisation and Subordinating conjunctions. This guide ...

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Teaching Morphology to Improve Literacy: A Guide for Teachers

Morphological awareness is a powerful tool for improving many areas of literacy. Find teaching ideas for specifically teaching this skill across a range of year levels.

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Improving the formality of students’ writing – nominalisation

This blog post explains how a practising teacher supports students to develop a confident and formal tone by teaching them to nominalise in their writing.

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Connecting Ideas

Help students to create well-structured sentences by developing their knowledge of compound sentences, compound complex sentences and ways to combine messages by using quoting as a device. This teacher resource will support your understanding of this topic and provide examples to use with students.

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Nominalisation: cure or crime?

This article about nominalisation provides background support about this topic for teachers. While written for NSW secondary English teachers, it has broader relevance for teaching this skill in Australian classrooms.