Teaching sequence

Work through this resource material in the following sequence:

15 minutes

Tune in: Thinking about genre and narratives

45 minutes

Find out: Stepping into the world of the text

45 minutes

Take action: Showing understanding

15 minutes

Reflection

Tune In: Thinking about genre and narratives

Step 1

Ask students to think about their knowledge of narratives. Remind them they have been reading and viewing narratives for years - they should think of themselves as experts! Ask them to share what they know about narratives. You could record what they know on an anchor chart or whiteboard.

Step 2

Ask students to tell you about some of the different literature genres they are familiar with. You might remind them of some that you have previously studied. Explain that they will be exploring the castaway/survival genre. Ask them if they know any texts from this genre.

Step 3

Facilitate a brief discussion about this genre, highlighting that within texts we usually see other themes, such as resilience, overcoming adversity, and friendship revealed.

Find Out: Stepping into the world of the text

Step 1

Spend some time focussing on comprehension skills. There is an opportunity here to undertake some explicit instruction using worked examples to demonstrate how students can use their prior knowledge, visualisation, predicting etc to identify literal and inferred meaning when reading texts.

In this lesson, students are given the opportunity to read or view texts that present the castaway or survival theme. Below is a list of suggested texts but you will find that this is a common theme in children’s literature. You may be familiar with other novels, films, short stories etc that fall into this genre. Use this list to compile your selection of texts for students to choose from.

2023 CBCA short listed:

August and Jones - Pip Harry
Evie and Rhino - Neridah McMullin
The Raven - Bren MacDibble & Zana Fraillon

Other novels

Hatchet - Gary Paulsen
My Side of the Mountain - Jean Craighead George (Note this is also a film text).
Nim’s Island - Wendy Orr.
Alone - Megan E. Freeman.
We are Wolves - Katrina Nanastad (highly acclaimed).

Film as text:

Alone Australia
Shipwrecked, 1990 film directed by Nils Guap
Far From Home - the Adventures of Yellow Dog, 1994 film, directed by Phillip Borsos

Step 2

After reading or viewing the text, ask students to capture their immediate understanding by writing a brief summary of the plot and the main characters. They might do this individually or share the tasks in small groups.

For example:

The film Shipwrecked is about a Norwegian boy called Haakon, who goes to sea to repay a family debt and experiences some amazing adventures. While at sea, the ships’ Captain is murdered by a villainous pirate, named Merrick. Merrick is impersonating Lieutenant Howell of the British Navy who comes on board to assist the Captain. After the death of the captain Merrick takes over the ship and while in the port of Sydney brings on his pirate mates. A violent storm causes the ship to crash onto rocks and Haakon is thrown overboard and finds himself washed up on an island. He explores the island and discovers some treasure that Merrick has hidden. He realises that Merrick will come back for his treasures so prepares traps to capture him. Haakon is reunited with his ship mates and together they overcome Merrick and his fellow pirates to claim the treasure. Haakon returns to Norway with this wealth and is able to repay the family debt ensuring they will not lose their farm.

Step 3

Ask students to think about the characters in their text. They should think about how their character is revealed. This is often through what a character says, how the character acts, how a character appears and how others react and respond to them (SAAO). Were there protagonists and antagonists in the text? What were their strengths and weaknesses?

Step 4

Facilitate a discussion with students where they think about the narrative structure of their text. There are four parts to consider when thinking about narrative structure – the complication, the conflict, the climax and the resolution. Ask students to develop a diagram that explains what happens in these four stages.

Step 5

If the text is a film, ask students to think about filmic codes such as costumes, sets and props, music, camera shots and angles. Students might need specific support from you to investigate these elements.

Step 6

Students think about the key messages/themes in the text they have studied. You might use a framework such as:

Think of a scene that….	Describe this scene…
…made you feel strong emotions (anger, fear, pride, scared) about what a character was experiencing.
…reminded you of a text where you had come across a similar theme.
…you thought was a powerful or important point in the text.

Take Action: Showing Understanding

Step 1

Students undertake a writing task (or more than one) on their text. Some ideas are below. These are structured using Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy. You could give students choice or direct them to a specific level. Alternatively, you could allocate points to each level, and students need to complete tasks to reach a negotiated total.

Remembering	Make a timeline or story map of the main events in the text.Describe your favourite character or part of the story.
Understanding	Working in pairs students create questions and and answers for a text to test literal and inferred meanings within the text or a section of it. These questions are then swapped with their partner. Explain the complication of the story and describe how the complication was resolved.Explain how you know the genre of this text.
Applying	Write a letter to the author/director explaining what you liked or disliked about the novel/film.List the important places in the text. Draw a map to show how you think these places would connect. Explain why location is significant within the world of the text.
Analysing	Compare two characters within the text (or from different texts if you have studied more than one). Use a Venn diagram to capture their similarities and differences. Then use these notes to write a well structured analysis of the characters. Think about the main character from your text. How would you describe them? What kind of person are they? What motivates them? What do they value? Use a table to record their personality and how the text reveals this. Use your notes to write a well structured character profile.Identify and explain the major theme and use some evidence from the text to show how you know this.
Evaluating	Think of a scene in the text where the main character responded or reacted in a certain way. Explain how you would have reacted differently and how this might have resulted in different outcomes. Write a detailed review of the text.Write a reflection on how the views and values held by the characters assist the writer to communicate the key themes, concepts and ideas of the text.
Creating	Step into the shoes of one of the main characters in the text studied. Complete one or more diary entries written from their point of view during one of the text’s important scenes. Make sure your diary entry(ies) communicates the emotions, values and ideas of the character. Create the front page of a newspaper using one of the main events from the text you have studied. Your front page should include the name of the newspaper, main headline, main article, picture, caption under picture, and the author of the article.

Reflection

Students use the Blooms’ Taxonomy Orange below to identify terms that relate to what they have done in their writing.

The Island: Text Study

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Summary

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