Semester 2 is already in full swing with many exciting things happening across the English faculty. This week students have been invited to submit their entries for our Kilbreda Creative Writing competition, launched by Student Leaders, Lilly and Siorcha. Our budding writers are challenged to develop a poem or short story inspired by the prompt: ‘Why am I talking to you? You’re not even real.’ Entries should be submitted to the competition box in the Library no later than Friday 29 July. Prize winners will be chosen from the Junior (7 to 9) and Senior (10 to 12) divisions and will be awarded Dymocks vouchers in recognition of their work.

Last week the VCE English team were incredibly impressed by the high quality oral presentations delivered by students. Charged with the demanding task of presenting to a panel of faculty staff on a contemporary societal issue, students developed and delivered a series of high quality speeches and complex arguments that demonstrated excellent understanding of the challenges facing both the national and international community, and of language and oracy skills. The speeches were a pleasure to watch and the students involved are to be commended for their excellent work.

This week, we were delighted to welcome acclaimed Australian writer, Rosalie Ham, to address our Year 12 students. As part of the Unit 4 English curriculum, students are studying her novel The Dressmaker, which contains a darkly comic depiction of life in rural Victoria during the 1950s. This was a wonderful opportunity for students to hear firsthand from the writer about the ideas explored within her work, which will serve them well as they prepare for their SAC and examination responses to this text, which they compare with Arthur Miller’s classic play, The Crucible.

An Afternoon with Rosalie Ham

On Wednesday 20 July, Rosalie Ham came to visit the Year 12 English students to discuss the novel we’re currently studying, “The Dressmaker”. Rosalie was able to offer us valuable insights into the inspiration behind the immersive world of Dungatar and what she wanted to communicate through the novel. It was great to hear her discussions of themes within the book such as jealousy, transformation and hypocrisy.

This afternoon gave the Year 12 English class an amazing opportunity to connect to “The Dressmaker” and build on our understanding to use in our upcoming comparative SAC. She also shared stories about her experience with the production of the 2015 film adaptation of her novel. Her meetings with Liam Hemsworth were of particular interest to the year level!

Overall it was a great experience and we all felt very lucky to hear from such an amazing writer.

Siorcha Creaton
Year 12

Nicola O’Shea
Learning Leader: English