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The nature of the learners
The transition to secondary schooling involves social and academic demands that coincide with a period of maturational and physical change. Learners are adjusting to a new school culture with sharper divisions between curriculum areas. Learners in this pathway have had little or no experience with Auslan, but are learning it with the expectation that it will be their primary language in the future. They have a range of experience with other signed or spoken languages, or a home gesture system, but may not be fluent in any standard language, and may have associated cognitive challenges. A multilevel and differentiated approach to teaching and task design responding to this diversity of prior experience is necessary, including using as much visual support as possible.
Auslan is learnt in parallel with English literacy. Learners in this sequence and pathway have little experience of English and are learning English literacy simultaneously to Auslan. As they have no access to spoken English, this poses particular challenges. The learning of Auslan supports and enriches deaf students’ learning of English.
Auslan learning and use
Rich language input characterises the first stages of learning. Learners engage in a range of activities designed to immerse them in language scaffolded to their level of linguistic and cognitive development. They build vocabulary for thinking and talking about school and home, routines and social worlds. They interact in structured routines and activities with their peers, family members and as many fluent signing adults as possible. They are supported to use Auslan for different language functions, such as asking and responding to questions, expressing wishes, responding to directions, and taking turns in games and simple shared learning activities. Learners may initially need time to watch Auslan without pressure to respond, until they feel comfortable with the situation and context. When they produce Auslan, they use well-known phrases to participate in familiar routines and structured conversations. Over this band, they continue to develop confidence in communicating about the here and now, and gradually begin to talk about the past or future and non-present entities or events.
Contexts of interaction
Learners at this level are given as much opportunity as possible to interact with their peers, the teaching team and members of the Deaf community for additional enrichment and authentication of their language learning. Information and communication technology (ICT) resources provide extra access to Auslan and to the cultural experience of deafness. A key expectation in the L1 pathway is that students will have opportunities to interact with a variety of native or near-native signing models. The familiarity and routine dimension of the classroom context provide scaffolding and opportunities for language practice and experimentation. Language development and use are incorporated into structured collaborative and interactive learning experiences, games and activities.
Texts and resources
Learners engage with a variety of signed texts, live and recorded. They watch the teacher signing, share ideas and join in activities, stories and conversational exchanges. They become familiar with ways of recording Auslan, either through film, photos of signs, line drawings of signs or simple symbols. An important source of texts is the Deaf community and older members of it.
Features of Auslan use
Learners in Years 7–8 can identify the handshape movement and location of signs. Depending on their access to home-sign systems, they make use of varying levels of handling or SASS depicting signs, gradually learning the conventions of Auslan. They learn to use entity depicting signs to discuss movement and location, decreasing their signing space to the conventional area. Learners at this stage use simple clause structures, modifying some verbs for present referents, and begin to understand and ask basic questions.
Level of support
The early stage of language learning is supported by extensive use of concrete materials and resources, gestures and body language. If the student has existing idiosyncratic gestures or home signs the teacher can access, these are used to scaffold their learning of Auslan. Learning is also supported through the provision of experiences that are challenging but achievable with appropriate scaffolding and support. This involves modelling, monitoring and moderating by the teacher; provision of multiple and varied sources of input; opportunities for revisiting, recycling and reviewing; and continuous cueing, feedback, response and encouragement. Use of recounting and retelling assists in establishing early language skills based on real-life experiences. The teacher provides implicit and explicit modelling and scaffolding in relation to meaningful language use in a range of contexts.
The role of English
Auslan is the language of all classroom interactions, routines and activities. Because these students do not have any English, they cannot make comparisons between English and Auslan. Research work in English is not an option for these learners. The students’ learning is focused primarily on developing Auslan capabilities as intensively as possible with a view to progressing to a state of communicative competence as soon as possible.
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Interact with peers and teachers to exchange information about self, family, friends and interests, describe people and objects and express some feelings and preferences
[Key concepts: interaction, communication, introduction, description; Key processes: socialising, expressing feelings, exchanging greetings, asking/responding to questions]
Participate in guided group activities such as signing games and simple tasks using repeatedstructures,and gestures
[Key concepts: game, learning activity, instruction, role-play, task; Key processes: participating, following instructions, classifying, exchanging, transacting, collaborating]
Participate in guided group activities such as signing games and simple tasks using repeatedstructures,and gestures
[Key concepts: game, learning activity, instruction, role-play, task; Key processes: participating, following instructions, classifying, exchanging, transacting, collaborating]
Developand interaction skills such as asking and responding to simple questions and statements and followingfor participation in Auslan classes and engaging with the Deaf community
[Key concepts: protocol, greeting, signing space, visual applause; Key processes: recognising, following instructions, gaining attention]
Developand interaction skills such as asking and responding to simple questions and statements and followingfor participation in Auslan classes and engaging with the Deaf community
[Key concepts: protocol, greeting, signing space, visual applause; Key processes: recognising, following instructions, gaining attention]
Locate specific points of information from signed texts about familiar topics and use the information in new ways
[Key concepts: information, topics, directions; Key processes: identifying, responding, following directions]
Locate specific points of information from signed texts about familiar topics and use the information in new ways
[Key concepts: information, topics, directions; Key processes: identifying, responding, following directions]
Present factual information about familiar topics using signs that have been modelled
[Key concepts: description, procedure, recount; Key processes: describing, demonstrating, recounting, reporting]
Participate in the viewing of recorded or live imaginative signed texts, responding through drawing, miming,or modelled signs
[Key concepts: story, imagination, Deaf art, gesture, mime; Key processes: viewing, drawing, responding, mimicking, shadowing]
Express imaginative ideas and visual thinking through the use of mime, gestures, drawing and modelled signs
[Key concepts: story, animation, constructed action; Key processes: re-enacting, depicting, constructing, representing]
Translate familiar words and phrases from Auslan to English and vice versa, noticing similarities and differences in meaning
[Key concepts: meaning, interpretation, translation; Key processes: translating, interpreting, identifying, comparing, recognising, paraphrasing, summarising]
different types of bilingual texts to support their classroom learning
[Key concepts: bilingual, meaning, translation, equivalent; Key processes: translating, labelling, developing, creating, captioning]
Explore the concepts of identity, social groupings, relationships, community and place and space, and deaf people’s visual ways of being and negotiating these networks
[Key concepts: identity, self, relationship, community, Deafhood, visual ways of being, place, space, reciprocity, responsibility; Key processes: identifying, discussing, exchanging]
Reflect on ways in which Auslan and associated communicative and cultural behaviours are similar to or different from other language(s) and forms of cultural expression
[Key concepts: intercultural experience, ways of knowing and being; Key processes: comparing, analysing, discussing, reflecting]
Identify and describe all elements of sign production, includingand its orientation, movement, location andand understand that signs can look like what they represent
[Key concepts: handshape, orientation, movement, location, hand dominance; Key processes: identifying, recognising, describing, understanding]
Recognise and restrict signing to the standard signing space, and understand that particular signs, depicting signs, some verbs,and pronouns make use of spatial relationships
[Key concepts: signing space, function of points, verb modification, depicting signs; Key processes: noticing, recognising, describing, comparing, distinguishing]
Recognise and restrict signing to the standard signing space, and understand that particular signs, depicting signs, some verbs,and pronouns make use of spatial relationships
[Key concepts: signing space, function of points, verb modification, depicting signs; Key processes: noticing, recognising, describing, comparing, distinguishing]
distinguishing between entity, handling or SASS DSs by looking at what the handshape represents in each type:
Recognise and use elements ofstructure, such as noun groups/phrases or verb groups/phrases and using conjunctions to shape structure
[Key concepts: sign class, nouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs, clause; Key processes: recognising, observing, distinguishing, understanding]
Recognise and use elements ofstructure, such as noun groups/phrases or verb groups/phrases and using conjunctions to shape structure
[Key concepts: sign class, nouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs, clause; Key processes: recognising, observing, distinguishing, understanding]
Recognise similarities and differences infeatures of different types of texts, and notice how signers buildin texts
[Key concepts: text, textual features,tracking; Key processes: recognising, identifying]
Recognise that there is variation in in how Auslan is used depending on context, environment and influences of other signed languages
[Key concepts:variation, influence, word-borrowing, change; Key processes: exploring, identifying, classifying, describing]
Develop awareness of the sociocultural context, nature and status of Auslan and of thein Australia and the impact of this onchange
[Key concepts: communication, transmission, accessibility,vitality; Key processes: identifying, describing, recognising, investigating, discussing]
Explore connections between language,and cultural practices, values and beliefs and the expression of these connections in Auslan
[Key concepts: language, culture,difference, transmission; Key processes: recognising, exploring, understanding, identifying]
Show subject-specific achievement standard
By the end of Year 8, students interact with the teaching team, class visitors and each other to share information about themselves, their families, friends, routines, pastimes and experiences. They refer to family members and classmates using fingerspelling or sign names as appropriate, and use lexical adjectives and some SASS depicting signs to describe people’s physical appearance and characteristics, for example POSS1 SISTER E-M-M-A, PRO3 SHORT RED HAIR . They use entity depicting signs to discuss movement and location. They recount shared and personal experiences, using simple clause structures, modifying some verbs for present referents or single absent referents for example PRO1 LIKE TV . They ask and respond to simple questions and distinguish between statements and questions using grammatical non-manual features (NMFs). They express likes, dislikes and feelings using lexical signs and affective NMFs, such as DON’T-LIKE DRAWING . They follow directions for class routines and instructions of two or more steps, using directional terms or depicting signs such as DS:turn-left DEAD END DS:turn-right . Students follow culturally appropriate protocols, such as responding to and using attention-gaining strategies such as flashing lights, waving or tapping a shoulder or table, using voice-off while signing and observing appropriate distance between signers. They identify specific points of information in signed texts, for example, colours, numbers, size or time. They present factual information about familiar topics, using modelled lexical signs and formulaic constructions. They demonstrate simple procedures using known signs, gestures, objects and list buoys. They recount and sequence events, using familiar signs and visual prompts and time markers such as 3-YEARS-AGO, IN-TWO-WEEKS or LAST NIGHT . They restrict signing to the standard signing space. They view short imaginative and expressive texts, such as poems and stories, demonstrating understanding through drawing, gesture and modelled signs. They create simple imaginative texts and retell wordless animations, using familiar signs, gestures, modelled language and visual supports, modifying NMFs and lexical signs to indicate manner. They translate high-frequency signs/words and expressions in simple texts. Students identify themselves as members of different groups and describe their relationships with deaf, hard of hearing students, family members and the larger Deaf community and also with the wider ‘hearing’ world. They consider how these different relationships contribute to their sense of identity. They identify places that are important to the Deaf community and describe how such places evoke a sense of belonging and pride. They recognise that one of the most unifying features of the Deaf community is the use of Auslan.
Students know that Auslan is a language in its own right, different from mime and gestures used in spoken languages, and that eye contact is necessary for effective communication. They know that meaning is communicated visually through the use of signs, fingerspelling, NMFs and non-conventional gestures. They identify and describe the handshapes, movements and locations of signs. They identify some signs that link to visual images, for example HOUSE, DRINK , and demonstrate signs that are body anchored, such as HUNGRY or SLEEP , and non–body anchored, such as HAVE or GO-TO . They identify how signers use space to track participants through a text, for example by pointing back to an established location to refer to a noun referent; and they identify ways signers refer to the same referent in a text, for example, by using DSs, points or list buoys. They know that signs can be displaced in space for a range of purposes, such as to show locations or to indicate participants in a verb. They know that signing involves telling, depicting or enacting. Students recognise variation in the use of Auslan, such as regional dialects and differences in signing space. They understand different ways that English words are borrowed into Auslan and how these become lexicalised. They recognise variation in how Auslan is used, for example by recognising regional dialects and differences in signing space and explain the nature of transmission of Auslan. They identify different ways Deaf community members communicate with each other and with members of the wider hearing community; and describe how digital forms of communication, such as social media, SMS/texting and NRS, have improved accessibility for the Deaf community and contribute to the vitality of Auslan. They recognise the importance of facial expression, eye gaze and NMFs in a visual-gestural language and culture.
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The nature of the learners
This stage of learning coincides with social, physical and cognitive changes associated with adolescence. Learners at this level are developing their cognitive and social capabilities and their communicative repertoire in the language, although it is likely they are still impacted by their late access to language and possibly by other challenges. As their language develops, so does their ability to conceptualise and reason, and their memory and focus improves. They are more independent and less egocentric, enjoying both competitive and cooperative activities. Learners at this level benefit from varied, activity-based learning that builds on their interests and capabilities and makes connections with other areas of learning. The curriculum ensures that learning experiences and activities are flexible enough to cater for learner variables, while being appropriate for learners' general cognitive and social levels.
Auslan learning and use
Learners in this band engage in a range of activities that involve watching and responding to a variety of signed texts. They build proficiency through the provision of rich language input from a range of sources where grammatical forms and language features are purposefully integrated. Learners build more elaborated conversational and interactional skills, including initiating and sustaining conversations, reflecting on and responding to others’ contributions, making appropriate responses and adjustments, and engaging in debate and discussion. The language they see and sign is authentic with some modification. They follow instructions, exchange simple information and express ideas and feelings related to their personal worlds. They negotiate interactions and activities and participate in shared tasks and games.
Shared learning activities develop social, cognitive and language skills and provide a context for purposeful language experience and experimentation. Individual and group presentation and performance skills are developed through researching and organising information, structuring and resourcing presentation of content, and selecting appropriate language to engage a particular audience. Learners use ICT to support their learning in increasingly independent and intentional ways, exchanging resources and information with each other and with young people of the same age in other signing communities. They access a variety of media resources, maintain vlogs and other web pages, and participate in social networks. They view and create texts on topics relevant to their interests and enjoyment and continue to build vocabulary that relates to a wider range of domains, such as areas of the curriculum that involve some specialised language use. The language used in routine activities is re-used and reinforced from lesson to lesson in different situations, making connections between what has been learnt and what is to be learnt.
Contexts of interaction
Learners interact in Auslan with each other, their teaching team, members of their families who can sign and members of the Deaf community. They have access to Deaf visitors and cultural resources in wider contexts and communities through the use of ICT and through the media. Language development and use are incorporated into collaborative and interactive learning experiences, games and activities.
Texts and resources
Learners work with a broad range of live and digital signed texts designed for learning Auslan in school and for wider authentic use in the Deaf community. They also engage with resources prepared by their teacher, including games, performances, presentations and language exercises. They may have additional access to BANZSL resources created for the Australian, New Zealand or British Deaf communities, such as children’s television programs, websites, music or video clips. In addition, they work with texts from other signed languages that make extensive use of the ‘visual vernacular’. Learners may also have access to community facilities and functions. The Deaf community is the most important resource for learning as it is the origin of most of the texts and communicative situations that learners engage with.
Features of Auslan use
Learners at this level increasingly use conventional Auslan: lexical signs or depicting signs with conventional classifier handshapes, and rely less on their idiosyncratic systems. They learn to modify some indicating verbs for non-present referents and use constructed action to represent themselves or others in recounts. They use a range of NMFs to distinguish questions from statements or negatives, and use more cohesion when signing texts. A balance between language knowledge and language use is established by integrating focused attention to grammar, vocabulary building, and non-verbal and cultural dimensions of language use with communicative and purposeful learning activity. Learners are increasingly aware that various signed languages are used in Deaf communities across the world. As they engage consciously with differences between languages and cultures, they make comparisons and consider differences and possibilities in ways of communicating in different languages. They build metalanguage to talk about aspects of language such as nouns, verbs and constructed action.
Level of support
While learners work more independently at this level, ongoing support is incorporated into task activity and the process of learning is supported by systematic feedback and review. Form-focused activities build students’ grammatical knowledge and support the development of accuracy and control in Auslan. Opportunities to use this knowledge in meaningful activities build communicative skills, confidence and fluency. Tasks are carefully scaffolded: teachers provide models and examples; introduce language, concepts and resources needed to manage and complete learning activities; make time for experimentation and for polishing rehearsed texts; and provide support for self-monitoring and reflection. Discussion supports learning and develops students’ conceptual frame for talking about systems of language and culture. Learners are encouraged to engage more with resources such as websites, dictionaries, translating tools and other materials designed to enrich their receptive and productive language use.
The role of English
Auslan is the language of all classroom interactions, routines and activities. As these learners are in the unique position of not having acquired a first language until very late in life, time spent developing their Auslan must be maximised. While these learners are simultaneously developing English literacy skills, use of English is limited to the translating thread and to small amounts of research with source texts in simple English.
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Describe activities and experiences and share and respond to ideas and feelings about people they know, their daily lives, social worlds and school community
[Key concepts: idea, feeling, description, experience; Key processes: recounting, describing, interacting, comparing]
Describe activities and experiences and share and respond to ideas and feelings about people they know, their daily lives, social worlds and school community
[Key concepts: idea, feeling, description, experience; Key processes: recounting, describing, interacting, comparing]
Participate in shared learning activities that involve planning, transacting and problem-solving, using simple signed statements, questions and directions
[Key concepts: planning, role, responsibility, support, information exchange; Key processes: negotiating, encouraging, describing, expressing preference]
Participate in shared learning activities that involve planning, transacting and problem-solving, using simple signed statements, questions and directions
[Key concepts: planning, role, responsibility, support, information exchange; Key processes: negotiating, encouraging, describing, expressing preference]
Communicate clearly in different classroom interactions and contexts, demonstrating appropriatewhen communicating with each other, teachers and deaf people
[Key concepts: instruction, interaction, protocol; Key processes: responding, negotiating, indicating, initiating, interrupting]
Communicate clearly in different classroom interactions and contexts, demonstrating appropriatewhen communicating with each other, teachers and deaf people
[Key concepts: instruction, interaction, protocol; Key processes: responding, negotiating, indicating, initiating, interrupting]
Identify, paraphrase or compare information obtained from a variety of signed texts or from their own data collection and present the information in different forms
[Key concepts: information, likes/dislikes, interests, preferences; Key processes: retelling, recording, organising, identifying, surveying, categorising]
Convey factual information and opinions in signed texts
[Key concepts: routine, event, hobby, procedure; Key processes: describing, reporting, explaining, presenting, instructing]
Engage with different types of creative texts, identifying and discussing characters, events and personal responses through the use of familiar signs, actions and artwork
[Key concepts: performance, character, personal response, creativity; Key processes: viewing, responding, participating, comparing]
or adapt imaginative texts and live or filmed expressive performances that involve imagined experiences and feature different characters, amusing experiences or special effects
[Key concepts: appearance, character, audience, animation, emotion, manner; Key processes: depicting, creating, presenting, re-enacting, reinterpreting, choreographing, performing]
Translate anddifferent types of familiar short texts, demonstrating awareness of individual interpretations of meaning
[Key concepts: equivalence, translation, meaning, interpretation, ethics, culture; Key processes: translating, interpreting, comparing, researching, shadowing, explaining]
bilingual texts such as notices, displays or newsletters for use in the wider school community
[Key concepts: translation, meaning, bilingualism, information; Key processes: translating, composing, comparing, creating, contributing]
Identify and analyse ways in which deaf people behave and relate within society as a distinct social group as ‘people of the eye’, demonstrate responsibility for connections between theand the wider ‘hearing’ society, and for culturally rich and appropriate places and spaces
[Key concepts: identity, relationship, Deafhood, advocacy, society, place, Deaf space, Deaf gain, responsibility, guidance; Key processes: identifying, discussing, comparing]
Reflect on the experience of learning and using Auslan in and out of school, and ways in which their understanding of interculturalhas developed
[Key concepts: intercultural communication, perspective, insight, self-reflection, making meaning, discrimination; Key processes: comparing, analysing, explaining, reflecting]
Explore various types of non-manual features, types ofin signs and the use of software to transcribe signs
[Key concepts: transcription, iconicity; Key processes: identifying, noticing, understanding]
Understand that signs can include different information, including a gestural overlay, and identify how signers establish spatial locations, types of depicting signs and ways of showing constructed action
[Key concepts: spatial location, grammatical use of space, constructed action, depicting signs; Key processes: noticing, identifying, recognising]
Understand and control additional elements of Auslan grammar, such as the use offor topicalisation, negation orforms, and develop awareness of how signers useand depicting signs
[Key concepts: topicalisation, negation, composite utterances; Key processes: recognising, distinguishing, understanding]
Explore the relationship between particulartypes, audience, purpose and context and analysefeatures used by signers to createand achieve the purpose of the text
[Key concepts: audience, purpose, convention, coherence; Key processes: noticing, identifying, analysing]
Explore the concept offlexibility, variation and change in relation to the use of Auslan across different contexts and times
[Key concepts:variation, standardisation, change,borrowing, adaptation; Key processes: researching, interviewing, comparing, identifying, analysing, discussing]
Understand the range of factors that influence the profile, diversity and distribution of Auslan use in the wider Australian society, and consider the concept of Auslan vitality in comparison with that of other languages
[Key concepts: influence, transmission,documentation,vitality; Key processes: recognising, identifying, describing, exploring]
Understand that Auslan andare interrelated, that they shape and are shaped by each other, that their relationship changes over time and across contexts, and that they may be differently interpreted by users of other languages
[Key concepts: knowledge, value, transmission, reciprocity, responsibility, stereotype; Key processes: reflecting, exploring, understanding, identifying, considering]
Show subject-specific achievement standard
By the end of Year 10, students use Auslan to share information, experiences, interests, thoughts and feelings in relation to their personal and immediate worlds. They describe the appearance of people, objects and places using SASS depicting signs and spatial location, for example, HAVE DS: round-oval DS: located HERE NEXT-TO HAVE BUILDING BIG. THERE . There’s an oval there and next to it is a big building. It’s there. They participate in shared learning activities and experiences that involve planning, transacting and problem-solving, using simple signed statements and asking for repetition and clarification when required. They follow protocols when interacting with each other, with interpreters or Deaf visitors to the classroom, for example, waiting for eye contact or pauses to walk in-between signers engaged in conversation without interrupting them. Students increasingly use conventional Auslan signs or classifier handshapes in depictions and rely less on their idiosyncratic systems. They modify some indicating verbs for non-present referents and use constructed action to represent others in recounts. They make explicit which referent is associated with location, for example, BROTHER THERE HAVE OWN IPAD . They recall and retell specific points of information from texts such as class messages, directions, procedures, introductions and ‘visual vernacular’ descriptions. They create textual cohesion through the use of connectives such as lexical signs NEXT or G:WELL, or non-manual features (NMFs) and pausing. They create bilingual texts such as notices or digital displays and resources for the classroom. They reflect on how their own ways of communicating may be interpreted when interacting with hearing people, and on how they adapt their ways of communicating and behaving when interacting with them. They reflect on the experience of communicating in a visual world and on the challenges and advantages experienced by deaf people in a hearing world.
Students describe how constructed action (CA) can be shown in different ways, including eye gaze, head orientation change or body shift. They identify where and how a signer establishes location in space, and they distinguish between real and abstract space. They build metalanguage to talk about aspects of Auslan, for example, using terms such as SASS, NMFs, CA, depicting signs; and they make connections with terms they use in learning English, such as verb, adjective, noun. They know that different languages and cultures influence and borrow from each other and identify connections between Auslan and other signed languages, for example, BSL, ISL and ASL. They make comparisons between Auslan and signed languages in other countries. Students know that Auslan plays an important role in the expression and maintenance of Deaf culture and in assuring the rights of every deaf person.
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