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NSW Curriculum
NSW Education Standards Authority

11–12English Studies 11–12 Syllabus

Record of changes
Implementation from 2026
Expand for detailed implementation advice

Content

Year 12

Texts and human experiences

Students deepen their understanding of how texts represent individual and collective human experiences. They examine how texts represent emotions and qualities related to these experiences. By responding to a range of texts, students explore how texts provide insight into emotional, intellectual, physical, cultural and lived experiences. They explore the ways texts represent identity, culture, acceptance and growth, invite the reader to see the world differently, and challenge assumptions. Students explore how texts can represent the tension between agency and conformity in our human experience, while examining the paradoxes of motivation and behaviour. Through critical and creative responses to texts, students consider the ways that texts encourage them to reflect personally and challenge their assumptions about the nature of human experience.

Understanding
  • The language, forms and features of texts that shape meaning for different audiences and purposes in familiar and unfamiliar texts

  • The language, forms and features of texts that shape a range of perspectives, personal and public worlds, and diverse human experiences

  • The aesthetic qualities of texts and the power of language to express personal ideas and experiences

  • Language used for making connections, questioning, affirming, challenging and speculating about texts

  • The evaluative language and metalanguage used to make informed judgements about texts and express personal perspectives

Responding
  • Develop creative, informed and sustained interpretations of texts, supported by close textual analysis

  • Compose creative and critical texts that affirm or challenge ideas, values and perspectives represented in a range of texts

  • Compose texts using structures, language features and stylistic elements for specific audiences, to reinterpret ideas and perspectives

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