Level B2 Reading and Viewing

The student work samples on this page are also available to download:

B2 Reading and Viewing proficiency levels and Achievement Standard

The students' performance in these tasks suggest that they are working within the range of Level B2 in Reading and Viewing. The assessing teacher will need to consider a range of student samples in order to determine whether each student is at the beginning of B2, consolidating B2 or at the B2 standard in Reading and Viewing.      

At beginning Level B2 students:     

  • read short familiar texts independently and read unfamiliar texts with considerable teacher support and encouragement
  • respond personally to texts, expressing opinions simply about texts they have read often relying on the teacher's reading and interpretation as a model for their own response
  • recognise the main purposes of factual and fictional texts and begin to identify some differences between the topic, structure and presentation of factual texts
  • continue to develop their reading strategies and use their developing knowledge of sound–symbol relationships and letter patterns, sight vocabulary and knowledge of English grammar.

At consolidating Level B2 students:     

  • read familiar texts with increasing confidence and continue to require teacher support to read unfamiliar texts with known words and predictable patterns
  • use organisation features (for example, headings, diagrams) to locate information in factual texts, with teacher support
  • are able to draw on their developing proficiency in English to comprehend and predict meaning but are still quite dependent on language developed through speaking and listening in English and may rely on key words for understanding
  • attempt to self-correct but may do so inconsistently
  • are able to complete simple tasks about texts however they may be able to demonstrate their understanding of texts more competently through oral rather than written language responses.

At Level B2 Achievement Standard students:

  • read familiar and unfamiliar texts containing predictable structures and familiar vocabulary. These texts may be print or digital, including visual, multimodal and interactive.
  • follow simple written instructions and questions
  • identify the basic purposes of simple texts, and recognise the basic stages of common text types
  • use their developing vocabulary and their knowledge of sentence structure and English letter–sound relationships to predict and self-correct
  • modify intonation to differentiate questions, exclamations or dialogue when reading aloud
  • follow simple time and logical relationships between events and ideas expressed by common cohesive devices
  • sequence sentences from known texts or a text on a familiar topic or experience
  • use simple strategies to assess text difficulty and to choose new texts to read.

Informative text - Connecting text to self (1)

Student information

This student was born in Thailand and the main language spoken at home is Burmese. He is 11 years and ten months old with a history of disrupted schooling in refugee camps. He has been in Australia for two years and spent six months in an English language school and about three months in another primary school prior to his current setting. He is currently in a Year 5 mainstream class.     

Task

The class has previously participated in three literacy lessons. At the beginning of each literacy session, the teacher reads a picture storybook and models text-to-self connections. During guided readings, students have been encouraged to volunteer their own connections to the text. In this task, the student was asked to choose a part of the story to which he had a connection. He reread this choice to the group explaining the reason for his choice and then independently completed a T-Chart to show his understanding as a personal response.     

The teacher was assessing:     

  • the student’s ability to express a personal response to a text by making connections to their personal experience
  • the student’s ability to express a personal point of view about a character’s actions and speculate on their own experience in a similar situation
  • the student’s ability to read fluently some common words and familiar phrases
  • the students’ ability to read compound sentences.

In the transcript, the words spoken by the student being assessed are in bold. The words spoken by other students and the teacher are in normal font.     

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This sample of student work demonstrates that the student can:

  • Acquire information from different types of visual representations in text (VCEALC347)
  • Understand the relationships between events or ideas in a text (VCEALL362)
  • Use knowledge of simple tense and negation to interpret the meaning of written text (VCEALL365)
  • Make and substantiate inferences and predictions when reading or listening to a text read aloud (VCEALC350)
  • Express a personal response to an imaginative text or elements of the text (VCEALC349)
  • Compare own experiences to those represented in texts (VCEALA356)

Overall, this student can also:

  • Read simple, unfamiliar informative, imaginative and persuasive texts, with support (VCEALC345)
  • Read texts that contain compound and complex sentences (VCEALL364) *see below for text read by student 

Possible next steps for this student's learning

  • Rewriting the section of the text, and replacing events in the text with his own experience (VCEALA278)(VCEALA273) 
  • Creating a vocabulary list of synonyms for the adjectives in the text, and using the list to support his writing (VCEALL287)

Pathways and transitions considerations

This Year 5 student is working within the range of Level B2 in Reading and Viewing. Therefore, he is not ready to transition to the English curriculum regardless of his proficiency in the other two language modes. This student will continue on Pathway B of the EAL curriculum in all language modes.      

Image of two pages from a book with illustrations and text.

Informative text - Connecting text to self (2)

Student information

This student was born in Thailand and the main language spoken at home is Burmese. He is 11 years and ten months old with a history of disrupted schooling in refugee camps. He has been in Australia for two years and spent six months in an English language school and about three months in another primary school prior to his current setting. He is currently in a Year 5 mainstream class.

Task

The class has previously participated in three literacy lessons. At the beginning of each literacy session, the teacher reads a picture storybook and models text-to-self connections. During guided readings, students have been encouraged to volunteer their own connections to the text. In this task, the student was asked to choose a part of the story to which he had a connection. He reread this choice to the group explaining the reason for his choice and then independently completed a T-Chart to show his understanding as a personal response.     

The teacher was assessing:

  • the student’s ability to express a personal response to a text by making connections to their personal experience
  • the student’s ability to express a personal point of view about a character’s actions and speculate on their own experience in a similar situation
  • the student’s ability to read fluently some common words and familiar phrases
  • the students’ ability to read compound sentences.

    • The words spoken by the student being assessed are in bold. The words spoken by other students and the teacher are in normal font.

  •            
  •            

This sample of student work demonstrates that the student can:

  • Understand the relationships between events or ideas in a text (VCEALL362)
  • Use knowledge of sentence structure to predict words or self-correct (VCEALL366)
  • Adapt speed when reading an unfamiliar text (VCEALL370)
  • Express a personal response to an imaginative text or elements of the text (VCEALC349)
  • Compare own experiences to those represented in texts (VCEALA356)
  • Make and substantiate inferences and predictions when reading or listening to a text read aloud (VCEALC350)

Overall, this student can also:

  • Read simple, unfamiliar informative, imaginative and persuasive texts, with support (VCEALC345)
  • Read texts that contain compound and complex sentences (VCEALL364)

Possible next steps for this student's learning

  • Re-reading the text aloud to a partner to practise fluency (VCEALL373)
  • Rewriting the section of the text, and replacing events in the text with his own experience (VCEALA356) 
  • Creating a vocabulary list of synonyms for the adjectives in the text, translating into his home language, and using the list to support his writing (VCEALA357) 
  • Describing each character based on how they felt using the list of adjectives from his vocabulary list (VCEALC349)

Pathways and transitions considerations

This Year 5 student is working within the range of Level B2 in Reading and Viewing. Therefore, he is not ready to transition to the English curriculum regardless of his proficiency in the other two language modes. This student will continue on Pathway B of the EAL curriculum in all language modes.

Persuasive text – Understanding persuasive elements in a film (2)

Student information

This student came to Australia 5 years and 3 months ago from Somalia. They studied in a new arrivals program for 6 months before entering mainstream school. They are 10 years and 4 months old and in Year 4. They speak Somali at home.

Task

Students have viewed and discussed the short animation film, Piper. They have been learning in class about text structure and cohesive devices. In this activity, students sort sentences into a text organiser under headings to create a film review. Students discuss with their teacher the structure of the text and the words that helped them to sequence the sentences correctly. This is the first time the student has seen this text.

The teacher is assessing the student’s ability to:

  • demonstrate an awareness of how ideas are organised in a text
  • sort the sentences into the correct sequence using the text organiser as a guide
  • recognise cohesive devices that help to order the points and examples.

The words spoken by the student being assessed are in bold.   

Transcript

00:06 – 2:26    

We've been talking about the different devices that the filmmakers used to tell the story because there are no words in the story, are there?    

(Together) Yeah.    

Yeah. Today we're going to look at somebody else's review of "Piper" and they're talking about the same three devices that we talked about. So, the person who wrote this review has talked about those three things and you can see there's a text organiser here. We've got a space for the introduction, and remember the introduction introduces us to the film and talks about what points we're going to make through the film. So it'll introduce these three things. Then we've got some sentences about contrast, some sentences about music and sounds, and some sentences about perspective and then there's a conclusion at the end. I've given you a little bit of a hint because I've got a separate box for each sentence, so you can see how many sentences you need. Sadik, do you want to choose one to put on?    

Yeah. This one.    

Okay. Read it for us.    

One example of contrast is when Piper gets hit by waves. The first time he runs back to his nest, shaking with fright, but, in contrast, later, Piper buries himself in the sand when a wave comes and then jumps around happily.    

Good! So where do you think that part belongs? What's it talking about? Is it talking about contrast, or music and sounds, or perspective?    

Oh, contrast.    

Contrast. Okay. Is it the topic sentence or do you think it's one of the examples?    

(Together) One of the examples.    

Why do you say that?    

Because it says, "one example".    

Okay. All right. Pop it in there.    

In conclusion, in this film, contrast, sounds and music, and perspective let us experience the events with the little seagull.    

So where do you think that one might go?    

In conclusion.    

Okay. In the conclusion?    

The first one.    

Why do you put it, why are you putting it in the conclusion?    

Because it says, "In conclusion."    

Excellent. Good clue.    

    

This sample of student work demonstrates that the student can:

  • Read simple, unfamiliar informative, imaginative and persuasive texts, with support (VCEALC345)
  • Understand the purpose and organisational features of common text types (VCEALL361)
  • Understand the relationships between events or ideas in a text (VCEALL362)
  • Read texts that contain compound and complex sentences (VCEALL364)
  • Modify intonation when reading aloud, to differentiate questions, exclamations or dialogue (VCEALL373)
  • Identify the structure of a small range of texts - sorting and sequencing (VCEALA352)
  • Understand and use a range of learnt metalanguage to talk about text (VCEALL363)

Possible next steps for this student’s learning

  • Continue to practise reading a wide range of simple, unfamiliar informative, imaginative and persuasive texts, with decreasing support (VCEALC345)
  • Read a range of text types, identifying and discussing their purpose and structure (VCEALA352)
  • Continue to develop a broad range of metalanguage to talk about text (VCEALL363)

Pathways and transitions considerations

A student who has achieved the B2 standard will continue on Pathway B to Level B3 of the EAL curriculum.

At the end of Year 6, all students who are working within the B2 range or who have achieved the B2 standard will transition to Pathway C in Year 7.

Under very limited circumstances, a Year 6 student may continue on Pathway B in Year 7 and 8 if:

  • there is continuity in the school program from primary to secondary, for example, a middle years EAL program in a F-10 school
  • it is developmentally appropriate for the individual learner.

Persuasive text – Plastic bags should be banned (1)

Student information

This student came to Australia 5 years and 3 months ago from Somalia. They studied in a new arrivals program for 6 months before entering mainstream school. They are 10 years and 4 months old and in Year 4. They speak Somali at home.

Task

As part of a focus on persuasive texts, the students have been practising reading with appropriate phrasing and expression to make a convincing oral argument. In this task, the students identify some of the language features of a persuasive text with teacher support, highlighting words or groups of words that carry important meaning and will therefore need to be emphasised. They then practise reading aloud, using the highlighted text to guide their use of intonation.

The words spoken by the student being assessed are in bold.  

Transcript

00:05 – 04:57   

Okay, Sadik and Asmhan. We are going to read an argument today. A persuasive text, and it's going to try to persuade us that plastic bags should be banned. We’ve been talking about some of the things that we find in persuasive texts and we're going to look for those in this text because when we read it aloud, we have to put an emphasis on those words that are really important that do a, an important job. Because when people are listening it helps them to understand what are the important words, and it helps us to convince them. All right, so we're going to be looking for some sequencing words to help our listeners organise it in their heads. We're going to be looking for some sensing verbs and modal verbs and they're the ones that tell the readers what we think. We're going to use some emotive words. We're going to find some emotive words because they're the ones that change the way that the person who's listening feels about the subject. And that's what we're trying to do. We're trying to change them so that they think and feel the same way that we do. And we're also going to look for any words that make our emotive words stronger or weaker. Can you read the first paragraph?   

Many people use plastic bags for shopping and millions are giving out, given out every in supermarket. I firmly believe that plastic shopping bags should be banned. They, they end up as land... out, or water pollution and plastic bags are dangerous to sea creatures. When bags go to landfill drums, they stay there for years.   

Let's look for some of the features that we find in persuasive texts. So when we practise reading out loud, again, we can put the emphasis on the words that are really, really important. Okay. Sadik, can you see a sequencing word in the second paragraph?   

Secondly.   

Secondly, perfect. That tells us it's the second argument. Let's change colours again. We're going to look for some emotive words. Now in the second paragraph it tells us that they look really bad. There's one word in there that tells us that they look really bad when they're blowing around in the parks and stuck in fences.   

During. No, no, no.   

Yeah. What? What does it say?   

It says plastic bags make our cities and parks look ugly.    

So what's the negative word?   

(Together) Ugly.   

What's one that if they look bad?  Yeah. Ugly. And at the end of that paragraph there's a sentence that tells us what happens when you are burning the paper bags, something bad happens.   

You can...um…   

Have a look. What are the words that tell us that this is a bad thing that comes off the plastic bags when you burn them? What were those things?   

They can   

Burn? In the last sentence of this paragraph, it starts here. If plastic bags are burned.   

They release poisonous gases   

And we are going to practice reading this, putting some emphasis on those words because that helps the person who's listening to know which the important words are.   

Firstly, thousands of bags are left to blow around in the streets. They get caught in trees in the parks and tangled up in fences. Plastic bags make our cities and parks look ugly. Some bags also blow into drains and block them or fly around in the water… waterways.   

Excellent.   

Also, plastic bags should be banned because they are hard to get rid of. When plastic bags are buried in landfill, they can take thousands of years to break down. If plastics… if plastic bags are burnt, they release poisonous gases into the air. Plastic bags are very bad for the environment.   

Oh, I liked that last sentence. Very bad for the environment. Fantastic reading. We're done.   

   

This sample of student work demonstrates that the student can:

  • Use resources to support reading and understanding, such as group discussions (VCEALC345)
  • Read texts that contain compound and complex sentences (VCEALL364)
  • Read some common words or familiar phrases (VCEALL367)
  • Apply knowledge of letter–sound relationships to read new words with some support (VCEALL368)
  • Adapt speed when reading an unfamiliar text (VCEALL370)
  • Understand and use a range of learnt metalanguage to talk about text - identifying learnt features of language in a text (VCEALL363)
  • Identify characteristics of the language of the text, such as features of intonation and emphasis (VCEALL360)
  • Contribute to group activities on shared texts - listening to group discussion, contributing relevant ideas and negotiating responses to the group activity (VCEALC351)
  • Identify the main idea in short texts using guide questions – finding key words (VCEALC346)
  • Modify intonation when reading aloud, to differentiate questions, exclamations or dialogue - using appropriate pauses and emphasis when reading aloud (VCEALL373)

Possible next steps for this student’s learning

  • Continue to read simple, unfamiliar informative, imaginative and persuasive texts, with decreasing support (VCEALC345)
  • Continue to learn about the purpose and structure of a range of common text types, and practise identifying informative, imaginative and persuasive texts (VCEALA352)(VCEALL360)
  • Learn and use an expanding range of metalanguage to talk about text (VCEALL363)
  • Modify intonation when reading aloud, to differentiate questions, exclamations or dialogue with decreased teacher support (VCEALL373)

Pathways and transitions considerations

A student who has achieved the B2 standard will continue on Pathway B to Level B3 of the EAL curriculum.

At the end of Year 6, all students who are working within the B2 range or who have achieved the B2 standard will transition to Pathway C in Year 7.

Under very limited circumstances, a Year 6 student may continue on Pathway B in Year 7 and 8 if:

  • there is continuity in the school program from primary to secondary, for example, a middle years EAL program in a F-10 school
  • it is developmentally appropriate for the individual learner.

Persuasive text – Plastic bags should be banned (2)

Student information

This student is 9 years and 6 months old and is in Year 4. They came to Australia from Saudi Arabia 3 years and 4 months ago and attended a new arrivals program for a year (including remote learning during COVID lockdowns) before enrolling in a mainstream school. They speak Arabic at home.

Task

As part of a focus on persuasive texts, the students have been practising reading with appropriate phrasing and expression to make a convincing oral argument. In this task, the students identify some of the language features of a persuasive text with teacher support, highlighting words or groups of words that carry important meaning and will therefore need to be emphasised. They then practise reading aloud, using the highlighted text to guide their use of intonation.

The words spoken by the student being assessed are in bold. 

Transcript

00:05-03:45  

Okay, Sadik and Asmhan. We are going to read an argument today, a persuasive text, and it's going to try to persuade us that plastic bags should be banned. And we've been talking about some of the things that we find in persuasive texts and we're going to look for those in this text because when we read it aloud, we have to put an emphasis on those words that are really important that do a, an important job. Because when people are listening, it helps them to understand what are the important words, and it helps us to convince them. All right, so we're going to be looking for some sequencing words to help our listeners organise it in their heads. We're going to be looking for some sensing verbs and modal verbs and they're the ones that tell the readers what we think. We're going to use some emotive words. We're going to find some emotive words because they're the ones that change the way that the person who's listening feels about the subject. And that's what we're trying to do. We're trying to change them so that they think and feel the same way that we do. And we're also going to look for any words that make out our emotive words stronger or weaker. Okay, so let's have a look at the first argument. Asmhan, can you read that one for us?  

Yes. Thousand. Wait. Firstly, thousands of bags are left to blow around the…wait. Around in the street they get catch… wait, catched…Caught in trees in the parks, and…  

Tangled.  

Tangled.  

Tangled up in fences.  

Okay, let's change colours again. We're going to look for some emotive words. Words that give us positive feeling or a negative feeling. Now the next sentence tells us two bad things that can happen when the sea creatures eat the plastic bags.  

Choke. - Choke is one. Yes. Choke means that it gets stuck in their throat and Asmhan, can you tell me the other one? What's the other one? They can choke or?  

Suffocate…suffocate.  

Suffocate. Suffocate means they can't breathe. All right. Put the lids on your textas and we are going to practise reading this, putting some emphasis on those words because that helps the person who's listening to know which the important words are. Asmhan. Last one. Okay.  

Do you want to help make our environment cleaner? There is no need to use plastic shopping bags when cloth, cloths and pa… paper bags can carry our shopping just as well. Cloth and paper bags are better because they can be used over and over again. These bags are much better for the environment.  

Excellent, great intonation Asmhan. I love the way you said bags are much better. Well done. Fantastic reading.  

  

This sample of student work demonstrates that the student can:

  • Use resources to support reading and understanding, such as group discussions (VCEALC345)
  • Begin to read texts that contain compound and complex sentences with support (VCEALL364)
  • Use knowledge of sentence structure to predict words or self-correct (VCEALL366)
  • Read some common words or familiar phrases (VCEALL367)
  • Adapt speed when reading an unfamiliar text - clarifying, if the meaning breaks down, by pausing, rereading and/or reading on (VCEALL370)
  • Begin to understand some learnt metalanguage to talk about text with support (VCEALL363)
  • Self-correct pronunciation (VCEALL371)
  • Modify intonation - using appropriate pauses and emphasis when reading aloud (VCEALL373)

Possible next steps for this student’s learning

  • Continue to read simple, unfamiliar informative, imaginative and persuasive texts, with decreasing support (VCEALC345)
  • Learn and use an expanding range of metalanguage to talk about text (VCEALL363)
  • Continue to build knowledge of phonemes, and practise using strategies such as breaking words into syllables and phonemes to read new words with some support (VCEALL368)
  • Continue to practise modifying intonation when reading aloud with decreased teacher support (VCEALL373)

Pathways and transitions considerations

A student who has achieved the B2 standard will continue on Pathway B to Level B3 of the EAL curriculum.

At the end of Year 6, all students who are working within the B2 range or who have achieved the B2 standard will transition to Pathway C in Year 7.

Under very limited circumstances, a Year 6 student may continue on Pathway B in Year 7 and 8 if:

  • there is continuity in the school program from primary to secondary, for example, a middle years EAL program in a F-10 school
  • it is developmentally appropriate for the individual learner.

Related pages 

Student work samples: Level B2 Speaking and Listening
Student work samples: Level B2 Writing
Student work samples: Level B3 Reading and Viewing
Student work samples: Level B1 Reading and Viewing