Holiday+Homework


 * Holiday Homework **


 * Term 3, 2011 **

As you may or may not be aware, our first module of HSC course will the Area of Study: Belonging.

In order to complete this module, you need to have at least two related material in addition to our prescribed text 'Strictly Ballroom' directed by Baz Lurhmann. It is necessary for you to start hunting for related texts now. The texts you choose can be of any form apart from film because our prescribed text is a film. Read the information presented below and then click on the PDF file for a comprehensive list of related text you can study.



**YOUR HOLIDAY HOMEWORK IS TO ANALYSE AND READ OR VIEW AT LEAST THREE TEXTS.** **YOU MAY NEED TO DO SOME RESEARCH AND FIND OUT WHAT IS BELONGING AND YOU MUST ANALYSE TECHNIQUES!**

**READ THIS AS IT WILL ASSIST YOU IN FINDING RELATED MATERIALS THAT IS SUITABLE FOR YOU.**

Some factors that might influence you in the selection of your own texts about belonging include:
 * Variety**

The syllabus requires that students ‘draw their chosen texts from a variety of sources, in a range of genres and media’. If a student’s prescribed text is prose fiction, for example, then it is recommended that the student not seek prose fiction for the ‘texts of own choosing’ category.
 * Compatibility**

Each new text chosen and used by a student must work effectively with the prescribed text that is being studied in class and other texts already identified. Note that the connections between texts might consist of similarities or differences about what the texts have to say about belonging or the ways in which belonging is represented. Such connections help students to write the kind of integrated response that markers are looking for in Section 3 of Paper 1. Each new text added to the mix should bring another layer to the discussion and not just reiterate what is already evident in the prescribed text.
 * Relevance**

Any text chosen and used must be relevant to the particular requirements for the study of //Belonging// delineated in //HSC English Prescriptions 2009–2012//.
 * Accessibility**

Texts must be accessible to the individual student. James Joyce’s //Portrait of the artist as a young man// might be a terrific text about belonging but there is no point giving this book to a student who is not a good reader! There are always alternatives at hand.
 * Sophistication**

While acknowledging the importance of accessibility, students should also be reminded that choosing facile or simplistic texts will not help them to demonstrate the sophistication of discussion required for assessment tasks and the HSC exam. The sophistication of a text of own choosing might be derived from the range, complexity and even the problematic nature of ideas about belonging presented in the text or from the range and cleverness of techniques used by the composer to represent those ideas.
 * Interest**

Ultimately students should personally value the texts they have chosen for the study of //Belonging//. If these texts are not interesting to them then it is unlikely that they will be able to communicate a sense of the value of the text to the marker in the HSC exam. It is important, therefore, that teachers do not simply direct students to use a particular text, or worse, teach an additional text to the whole class with the expectation that all will use it.