The Australian Curriculum and the HAR -Tools for Teachers

REFER TO OUR NEW HAR TEACHER’S BOOK FOR MORE CURRICULUM LINKS!

Supporting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children’s learning: Intentional teaching

Foundation to Year 2.

Connecting the Honey Ant Reading series to the Australian Curriculum English – Foundation to Year 2.

This reading series can be used for any emerging reader or EAL/D student up to Year 2.

All texts are built around the settings, contexts and images typical of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples and language groups in Northern Australia.

Communities have been pivotal in developing the stories, images and materials.

Foundation – Year 2

From Foundation to Year 2 students communicate with peers, teachers, community members, and students from other classes.

Students engage with a variety of texts for enjoyment. They listen to, read and view spoken, written and multimodal texts built around the community’s life, belief systems and traditions.

The Honey Ant Readers series engages children using traditional Aboriginal English to learn Standard English language through oral and written texts, visual stimulus, rhyming verse and singing.  They initially engage with Aboriginal English texts (Readers 1-5) then transition to using structured Standard English (Readers 6-20).

The Honey Ant Readers series provides teachers and their children:

  • with opportunities to engage with traditional Aboriginal and Torres  Strait  Islander  peoples’ stories, built around traditional language structures, to access and learn Standard English;
  • with opportunities to participate in shared reading,  viewing and storytelling based on traditional themes;
  • with opportunities to engage in grammar, phonics, song, rhyme and rhythm and learn that texts entertain and inform readers.

The Honey Ant Readers are Literary texts that support and extend beginner readers  and include predictable texts that range from caption books to books  with one  or more  sentences  per page.

These texts involve straightforward sequences of events and everyday happenings  with recognisable and realistic stories, based on community traditions and beliefs.

The Honey Ant Readers:

  •  provide a small range of language features, including simple punctuation , words and compound sentences;
  • build upon familiar  Aboriginal English , known high frequency words  and  single­-syllable words  that can be decoded phonically;
  • use illustrations that strongly support the printed text and depict traditional community habits and oral stories told.

Connections to Australian Curriculum

Australian Curriculum English strands Foundation                           Honey Ant Reader connection to Elaborations
LanguageLanguage variation and change(ACELA1426)
  • recognising that some texts can include both Standard  Australian  English  and  elements of  other  languages including Aboriginal and Torres  Strait Islander languages.
(ACELA1428)
  • learning that we use a different tone and style of language with different people.
Text structure and organisation(ACELA1430)
  • repeating parts of texts, for example characteristic refrains,  predicting cumulative storylines, reciting poetic and rhyming  phrases
(ACELA1431) 
  • learning that written text in Standard Australian English has  conventions  about words, spaces between words, layout on the page  and  consistent  spelling  because  it has to communicate when the speaker/writer is not present
(ACELA1432) 
  • commenting on punctuation encountered in the everyday texts,
LiteratureLiterature and context(ACELT1575)
  • recognising that there are storytellers in all cultures:  viewing stories by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people
  • storytellers from online sources comparing  experiences  depicted  in  stories  with  students’ own
  • engaging with texts that reflect the social and cultural groups  to  which  students  belong
Responding to literature(ACELT1577) 
  • talking about stories and authors, choosing favourites,  discussing how students feel about what  happens  in stories
Examining literature(ACELT1578) 
  • identifying some features of culture related to characters and events  in literary  texts,  for  example  dress,  food and daily routines,
  • listening, responding to and joining in with rhymes, poems,  chants  and  songs
LiteracyText in context(ACELY1645) 
  • example exit signs, logos, hearts and flowers on greeting cards
(ACELY1784) 
  • listening and responding to oral and multimodal texts including   rhymes  and  poems,  texts read aloud and various types of digital texts
Interpreting,  analysing, evaluating(ACELY1649)  
  • navigating a text correctly, starting at the right place and  reading  in  the  right  direction,  returning to the next line as  needed, matching  one  spoken  word  to  one  written word
  • attempting to work out unknown words by combining  contextual,  semantic,  grammatical  and phonic knowledge
 Creating texts (ACELY1651)  
  • using beginning concepts about print, sound–letter and word  knowledge and punctuation to create short texts
(ACELY1652)  
  • rereading collaboratively developed texts to check that they   communicate  what  the  authors intended
(ACELY1653)  
  • learning to construct lower case letters and to combine these into words

Achievement standards connections

By the end of the Foundation year, students use predicting and questioning strategies to make meaning from texts. They  recall one or two events from texts with familiar topics. They understand that there are different types of texts and that these can have similar characteristics. They identify connections between texts and their personal experience.

They read short, predictable texts with familiar vocabulary and supportive images, drawing on their developing knowledge of concepts about print and sound and letters. They identify the letters of the English alphabet and use the sounds represented  by most letters. They listen to and use appropriate language features to respond to others in a familiar environment. They listen for rhyme, letter patterns and sounds in words

Productive modes (speaking, writing and creating) 

Students understand that their texts can reflect their own experiences. They identify and describe likes and dislikes about  familiar texts, objects, characters and events.

In informal group and whole class settings, students communicate clearly. They retell events and experiences with peers  and known adults. They identify and use rhyme, letter patterns and sounds in words. When writing, students use familiar  words and phrases and images to convey ideas. Their writing shows evidence of sound and letter knowledge, beginning  writing behaviours and experimentation with capital letters and full stops. They correctly form known upper­ and lower­case  letters.