Tag: assessment
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Aligning 7-10 with the new VCE English and EAL Study Design
Before beginning this article, I need to point out that I absolutely do not recommend turning the 7-10 curriculum into a “mini VCE”, or a funnel that only points students towards the senior certificate. There are many varied pathways students can take through secondary school, and the VCE is only one of them. When I […]
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VCE English and EAL: Assessing the new Crafting and Creating Texts outcomes
In all of the Professional Learnings I’ve been running recently related to the new Study Design, the assessment question has cropped up more than any other. We don’t have a sample examination yet; and we won’t get one until well into next year. But the VCAA have provided us with Unit 3 and 4 Performance […]
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Using Comparative Judgement to Assess Writing
If you’ve ever formally assessed senior English (at least here in Victoria), then you’ve used comparative judgement to assess writing. Comparative judgement, as the name suggests, is an assessment method based on comparing responses to determine their overall placement on an assessment scale. It’s an effective method supported by research, much of which is outlined […]
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Why write?
This is an early extract from our book Practical Writing Strategies, which will be published in 2023 by Amba Press. The elephant in the room Most of the time, we get students to write so we can assess them on their knowledge. Simple. It’s a sad truth that the main purpose of most writing in […]
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VCE English and EAL 2023: Exploring Argument
This is the fifth in a series of posts on the upcoming 2023 VCE English and EAL Study Design. For the first four posts, see the links at the end. In the current Study Design, Analysing and Presenting Argument (APA) dominates 50% of the outcomes for Units 1 and 2. In Unit 1 “students focus […]
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VCE English 2023: Mentor Texts and Ideas
This is the fourth in a series of posts on the upcoming 2023 VCE English and EAL Study Design. For the first three posts, see the links at the end. Mentor Texts In the new Study Design mentor texts are “Texts to be read and re-read as models of effective and cohesive writing.” They are […]
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VCE English 2023: The Personal Response
Over the next series of posts I’ll be exploring the upcoming changes to the VCE English Study Design for Units 1 and 2, which begins in 2023. These posts cover VCE English: with the expanded SD for EAL, English as an Additional Language now warrants a separate discussion which I’ll cover in a later post. For the previous post […]
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In defence of TEEL? (Sort of. Not really)
DISCLAIMER: Engaging in discussions about TEEL can be bad for your health. If there’s one thing that comes up time and time again when I’m talking to English teachers it’s TEEL. The acronym, which stands for Topic – Evidence – Explanation – Link, is so widespread that you can find it plastered across the walls […]
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Video mini-series: Effective and Sustainable Assessment
Effective and sustainable assessment. In this video, I offer three important points about assessment and feedback: You don’t have to mark everything, you don’t have to mark it yourself, and you don’t have to mark it at all. Providing feedback can be one of the most time consuming parts of teaching, but it doesn’t have […]