English / Year 9 / Literature / Examining literature

Curriculum content descriptions

Investigate and experiment with the use and effect of extended metaphor, metonymy, allegory, icons, myths and symbolism in texts, for example poetry, short films, graphic novels, and plays on similar themes (ACELT1637)

Elaborations
  • identifying examples of language devices in a range of poems, ballads or poetic extracts, and considering how their use adds to meaning and may also influence the emotional responses of listeners or readers, in varying ways
  • exploring how language devices look or sound in written or spoken texts, how they can be identified, purposes they serve and what effect they might have on how the audience responds
  • taking a particular area of study, a topic or theme and examining how different authors make use of devices like myth, icons and imagery in their work
General capabilities
  • Literacy Literacy
  • Critical and creative thinking Critical and creative thinking
ScOT terms

Figures of speech

Video

Jane Eyre: Fairytale and realism

Do you detect a hint of the supernatural in Jane Eyre? Professor John Bowen, Professor of Nineteeth-century Literature at the University of York, says, 'It is a novel with a lot of haunting in it.' Listen as Professor Bowen discusses the fairytale and gothic elements in Charlotte Bronte's classic novel. This clip from The ...

Video

Interviews With 10 Australian Authors, Ch 7: Playing with Hannie Rayson

It was while Hannie Rayson was at acting school that she realised she wanted to be a playwright. In this interview led by Tom Tilley she talks about how she began writing plays, why she became interested in the notion of Anglo Australian art and culture, and how all her characters are in some way an embodiment of herself.

Text

The Hunger Games

This web page includes a range of resources to support classroom studies of the novel and film 'The Hunger Ganes'. Resources include a study guide, explorations of characters, themes and issues and tips on writing essays. The resources discuss the use of film techniques to create setting, the genre of dystopia and the concept ...

Video

Interviews With 10 Australian Authors, Ch 4: Poetry with Robert Adamson

Australian poet Robert Adamson speaks to Tom Tilley about his extraordinary life, including his experience of being sent to a boys' home as a teenager, of his life-changing discovery of Bob Dylan, and of the spiritual connection he feels with the Hawkesbury River. The Golden Bird is a collection of his poems written throughout ...

Online

What is Shakespeare Unbound?

Shakespeare doesn’t get any better than this. Actors from Australia’s famous Bell Shakespeare Company, including Artistic Director John Bell, present key scenes from six of Shakespeare’s best-known works before joining conversations to dissect the playwright’s use of character, plot and language. Custom-made for Australian ...

Video

Heywire: Fortissimo frogs frustrate family

How could words convey the nightly racket of hundreds of croaking frogs outside your bedroom window? Can you think of ways to engage readers' senses so that they 'experience' the frog chorus? A use of imagery is one of them. It's something we'll explore in this humorous story about the perils of frogs. Could you write or ...

Interactive

Youth Theatre (unit)

Youth theatre is a unit resource with three self-contained and independent resources for English and drama students. The unit focuses on the play 48 Shades of Brown, adapted from Nick Earls' award winning novel. It examines the themes, issues, setting, characters and language of the play. It also examines the staging of ...

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

Engaging with poetry - modern poems

This resource focuses on modern poetry from a range of contemporary source. Students have the opportunity to learn about how language forms and features of a selection of modern poems. They explore how composers use language, rhythm and imagery to engage their audience and the ways in which imaginative texts can explore ...

Audio

Heywire: Autobiography of a flood survivor

Imagine if the town or suburb you live in came under threat due to a natural disaster. How would you react? Shelby Garlick from Kerang, Victoria, was a finalist of the 2012 Heywire storytelling competition for young people. Listen to her inspiring story and explore the lessons she learnt as a result of working with her ...

Interactive

Syllabus bites – responding to literature

A web page with information, teacher guides and resources on responding to texts. This resource supports the NSW English K-10 syllabus.

Interactive

Engaging with poetry - odes

This resource focuses on a selection of odes. Students have the opportunity to learn about how language forms and features of odes, how composers use language, rhythm and imagery to engage their audience and the ways in which imaginative texts can explore and express emotion and feeling. Students have the opportunity to ...

Interactive

Composing a graphic novel

This resource examines how authors and illustrators design and develop graphic novels. Student can use the resources to design, develop and publish their own graphic novel. Contains a list of print and digital resources needed to teach the unit. This resource supports the Australian Curriculum in English K–10.

Online

Shakespeare's Seven Ages of Man

The Seven Ages of Man is a monlogue from Shakespeare's play 'As You Like It' which is depicted in a series of stained glass windows at the State Library of NSW. Inspired by the text and the visual representation, a sequence of two activities guide students to write the 'Seven Ages of Women' and design stained-glass windows ...

Video

The Tempest: Two sides of Caliban

Caliban is one of Shakespeare's most fascinating characters. Half human and the son of a witch, Caliban attacks Prospero's daughter Miranda. However, he is not without a sympathetic side. In this scene from Act 1.2 of 'The Tempest', with Miranda Tapsell, John Bell and Damien Strouthos of Bell Shakespeare, Caliban's impassioned ...

Text

Performing a Haiku: How can spoken word transform a poem?

In this lesson, students will reflect on small moments of peace or happiness to write an original haiku. Students will demonstrate spoken word to perform a haiku for an audience.

Text

Work Sample Year 9 English: Macbeth oral presentation

This work sample demonstrates evidence of student learning in relation to aspects of the achievement standards for Year 9 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

Nicki Greenberg

This resource is a series of videos featuring writer Nicki Greenberg talking about her career and graphic novels. Related resources and teaching notes are included.

Video

Hamlet: Torment and tragedy

Hamlet is one of Shakespeare's most tormented tragic heroes. Unlike the protagonists of most other tragedies, Hamlet begins the play in a state of anguish. In this early soliloquy, the audience learns why. Tom Conroy from Bell Shakespeare realises Hamlet's agony in this moving excerpt from Act 1, scene 2.

Video

Getting inside Hamlet's mind

Imagine your whole world has been turned upside down. How would you react? Join James Evans and actor Tom Conroy from Bell Shakespeare as they explore how this soliloquy from Act 1 reveals Hamlet's fragmented state of mind following the death of his father and, as he sees it, his mother's betrayal. Learn how the soliloquy ...