Core Skills Analysis
Languages and English
Grace used Duolingo to learn multiple languages, including Auslan, and practised engaging with language-learning activities. Through this work, Grace developed experience noticing and learning language forms across more than one language. Learning Auslan also introduced Grace to a signed language, broadening understanding of how people communicate beyond spoken languages. This activity supported curiosity about languages and communication, without establishing which specific words or skills Grace mastered.
Chess
Grace used Duolingo to learn chess, engaging with a structured way of exploring the game. This provided an opportunity to become familiar with chess as a system of pieces, rules and possible moves. As Grace worked through chess-learning activities, the experience could support logical thinking and considering choices, while the activity description does not identify particular strategies or skills mastered. Learning chess alongside languages also brought together different kinds of learning in one activity.
Tips
Tips Extend Grace’s language learning by choosing a useful everyday phrase in each language and making a small illustrated phrase card; for Auslan, use a reputable Auslan learning resource and practise respectfully with attention to visual communication. Invite Grace to compare how a phrase is expressed across the languages being learned, noting similarities and differences without treating languages as interchangeable. For chess, play a short game together and pause at selected turns to explain possible moves and predict what might happen next. Grace could finish by keeping a simple learning journal with one new language observation and one chess idea from each session.
Book Recommendations
- Chess for Children by Murray Chandler: A child-friendly guide to learning chess, with clear explanations and practical examples.
- The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language by Steven Pinker: An accessible, widely known exploration of how human language works; best suited to reading together or selecting sections for a young learner.
Learning Standards
- English — ACELY1733 (Year 8): Engaging with multiple languages supports attention to vocabulary and language features when interpreting language content.
- English — ACELY1808 (Year 8): Learning Auslan connects to considering how language and communication conventions suit different situations. The activity does not establish that Grace delivered or practised a presentation.
- HASS — WAHASS23 (Year 8): Grace’s engagement with language learning and chess provides an opportunity to reflect on new understandings; further reflection would make this connection explicit.
Try This Next
- Make an illustrated phrase card for one useful expression in each language Grace is learning.
- Create a chess-piece reference sheet showing each piece’s legal movement.
- After a short chess game, write or draw one move Grace considered and what happened next.
- Make a language-comparison chart: phrase, language, and one observation about how it is communicated.