12 Essential English – Australian narratives unit – Setting development + a story about a bushfire

About the PPT:
The lesson begins with information about what setting is and how writers reveal setting. There are 3 brief excerpts of text with really different settings which students can read to see how the authors establish the setting whilst introducing the protagonist. There are some tips about developing indoor and outdoor settings. Then there are a series of clips from Australian television shows which we view and students take notes about things which appear in the setting. This is followed by information about imagery and using the five senses within your writing. Following this, I suggested other language features which could be used to establish setting including similes and metaphors. I also discussed the concept of extended metaphors. I also provided examples of settings which can be used symbolically. Then I introduced the story for today ‘Black Saturday’ and some context about the 2009 bushfires. Some of the terms that students may be unfamiliar with have been defined on the slide. After reading the story, there are some discussion questions which I use with the students. Students then share their responses for the retrieval chart. Afterwards there was a short YouTube clip for students to view. In the following lesson we watched an episode of the ABC TV series ‘Fires’ about the 2019/2020 bushfires.

Other resources:
A copy of the Short Story and the retrieval chart

Context: A lesson designed for use in a 12 Essential English classroom in Queensland, Australia as part of Unit 4: “Representations and popular culture texts - Topic 2: Creating representations of Australian identities, places, events and concepts.” During this unit students learned about Australian social groups. They engaged with a range of short stories representing Australia. Their assessment was to write a short story which explored a gap/silence from one of the texts they studied in class.