English Extension 2 (Year 12) 1 Unit

Prerequisites: The Extension 2 course only takes place in Year 12. Students will be required to express interest at the conclusion of the Preliminary course. They are required to have successfully completed the Preliminary Advanced English and Preliminary Extension 1 courses, and for both of these courses to be continued in Year 12. Discussion with the Head of English will be required. 

This module requires students to work independently to plan and complete a Major Work in the form of an extended composition. It allows students to select an area of personal interest from their specialised study of English and develop their work in this area to a level of distinction. 

Students compose the Major Work as an extension of the knowledge, understanding and skills developed in the English (Advanced) and (Extension) courses. The Major Work is to be substantial. It may be imaginative, investigative, interpretive, analytical or any combination of these. The chosen form and medium must be appropriate to the nature of the task, the student’s interests and abilities and the resources available. 

To provide the basis for the Major Work, students undertake ongoing, systematic and rigorous investigation into their chosen area. This investigation process is documented in a journal that demonstrates the processes of inquiry, interprets, analyses and reflects on the knowledge and understanding gained, and explains the stages of the composition of the Major Work. 

The Major Work will be assessed internally as a process and externally (by NESA markers) as a product.

The Extension 2 course will now include an externally examined unit, Author & Authority. In this unit students explore how originality and innovation in literature create new ways of expressing meaning. They examine how genre, technology, and form can shift control of a text and challenge the idea that the author is the main authority.

 As part of this, students engage in a specific author study. They consider how much control the author has over a text’s meaning and how both authors and readers reuse and reshape ideas and language within a broader literary tradition. Through this study, they explore key thinkers, theories, and movements. This unit is studied alongside the creation of the Major Work.

Various internal assessments will support the development of the Major Work at key stages of the compositional process, preparing students for their final submission towards the end of the Year 12 course.

Students will sit an external online examination on Author & Authority at the end of the course during the HSC examination period.