Common Module:

Texts and Human Experiences

What is the common module?

It is compulsory to study this topic as prescribed by NESA and it is common to all three English courses.

In this module, students will explore a range of texts, including the prescribed text Billy Elliot, which will deepen their understanding of how texts represent individual and collective human experiences.

Students will focus on the context of 1980’s Britain and how this is depicted through the emotions and experiences of the characters in Billy Elliot. Students will analyse a range of smaller texts and through investigation of their textual structure, language, and stylistic features, they will deconstruct how common and individual human experiences are illuminated in texts.

By responding to a range of texts they further develop skills and confidence using various literary devices, language concepts, modes, and media to formulate a considered response to texts. As this module requires differentiation based on the course being delivered, teaching, and learning activities may need to be modified by the teacher to ensure that they effectively meet the needs of their cohort.

Focus Questions

How does the text represent individual human experiences?
How does the text represent collective human experiences?
How does the text represent human qualities?
How does the text represent human emotions?
How do texts allow you to see the world differently, challenge your assumptions and ignite new ideas?

English Studies Stage 6 Outcomes

ES12 1 comprehends and responds analytically and imaginatively to a range of texts, including short and extended texts, literary texts and texts from academic, community, workplace and social contexts for a variety of purposes

ES12 2 identifies, uses and assesses strategies to comprehend increasingly complex and sustained written, spoken, visual, multimodal and digital texts that have been composed for different purposes and contexts

ES12 3 accesses, comprehends and uses information to communicate in a variety of ways

ES12 4 composes proficient texts in different forms

ES12 5 develops knowledge, understanding and appreciation of how language is used, identifying and explaining specific language forms and features in texts that convey meaning to different audiences

ES12 6 uses appropriate strategies to compose texts for different modes, media, audiences, contexts and purposes

ES12 7 represents own ideas in critical, interpretive and imaginative texts

ES12 8 understands and explains the relationships between texts

ES12 9 identifies and explores ideas, values, points of view and attitudes expressed in texts, and explains ways in which texts may influence, engage and persuade different audiences

ES12 10 monitors and reflects on own learning and adjusts individual and collaborative processes to develop as a more independent learner

Individual and collective human experience

1970s spiritualist Ram Dass described the human experience this way:

"If you and I go through a small town and if you are hungry, you will notice pizza places, donut shops and restaurants and if I go through the town, with a strange sound in my engine, I will notice repair shops and gas stations. You and I really went through different towns."

What is this saying about individual and collective human experiences?

Explore the effect of falling in love

All texts, in some way, explore human experiences. Many explore how those experiences - while common to many people are also individual and unique to each one of us.

Students listen to and read the lyrics of two songs and answer the following questions:

My Girl by The Temptations

I've got sunshine on a cloudy day

When it's cold outside

I've got the month of May

I guess you'd say

What can make me feel this way

My girl, my girl, my girl

Talkin' 'bout my girl

My girl

I've got so much honey

The bees envy me

I've got a sweeter song

Than the birds in the trees

Well, I guess you'd say

What can make me feel this way

My girl, my girl, my girl

Talkin' 'bout my girl

My girl

Ohh ohh

Hey hey hey

Oh yeah

I don't need no money, fortune, or fame

I've got all the riches baby one man can claim

Well I guess you'd say

What can make me feel this way

My girl, my girl, my girl

Talkin' 'bout my girl, my girl, talkin' 'bout my girl

I've got sunshine on a cloudy day with my girl

I've even got the month of May with my girl

Talkin' 'bout, talkin' 'bout, talkin' 'bout

Source: Musixmatch

Experiences are occurrences that lead to feelings and knowledge.

Experiences can be positive and negative.

Is the experience in this narrative positive or negative?

What exactly does the persona of this narrative experience?

What emotions is the persona experiencing?

What does the persona learn from this experience?

The composer of this song has used metaphors, personification and hyperbole to express their experiences of love. Identify an example of each from this text.

I LET LOVE IN - NICK CAVE & THE BAD SEEDS

Despair and Deception, Love’s ugly little twins

Came a-knocking on my door, I let them in

Darling, you’re the punishment for all my former sins

I let love in

The door it opened just a crack, but Love was shrewd and bold

My life flashed before my eyes, it was a horror to behold

A life-sentence sweeping confetti from the floor of a concrete hole

I let love in

Well I’ve been bound and gagged and I’ve been terrorized

And I’ve been castrated and I’ve been lobotomized

But never has my tormentor come in such a cunning disguise

I let love in

O Lord, tell me what I done

Please don’t leave me here on my own

Where are my friends?

My friends are gone

So if you’re sitting all alone and hear a-knocking at your door

And the air of promises, well buddy, you’ve been warned

Far worse to be Love’s lover than the lover that Love has scorned

I let love in

Experiences are occurrences that lead to feelings and knowledge.

Experiences can be positive and negative.

Is the experience in this narrative positive or negative?

What exactly does the persona of this narrative experience?

What emotions is the persona experiencing?

What does the persona learn from this experience?

The composer of this song has used metaphors, personification and hyperbole to express their experiences of love. Identify an example of each from this text.

Comparing the two texts - write a PEEL paragraph.

How do these texts convey the collective human experience of love?

Summary questions for the Texts and Human Experiences module.

How would you define this module in your own words?
How are people connected by shared experiences?
How do you think a person's context and prior experiences shape how they perceive the world?
To what extent does experience shape the way we see other people and / or groups?
Is it possible not to have any meaningful experiences at all?
Why do people tell stories?
What do you think you might learn from a narrative?

Possible essay questions in the rubric

What ideas about human experiences are in the text and how has the composer used techniques to communicate these ideas?
How does the text represent individual human experiences?
How does the text represent collective human experiences?
How does the text represent human qualities?
How does the text represent human emotions?
How does the text give insight into anomalies and paradoxes of human experience?
How does the text give insight into inconsistencies of human experience?
How does the text express and reflect particular lives and cultures?
How does the world of the text connect to issues in the wider world?
How has the composer used language to represent individual and collective human experiences?
How has the composer used characters (human experiences) to provoke responders to see the world differently and ignite new ideas?
How has the composer used characters (human experiences) to provoke responders to challenge assumptions?
How has the composer used characters (human experiences) to express universal themes?
How has the composer used form, structure, stylistic and grammatical features (form and techniques) to shape messages about human experiences?

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