QCAA English case studies
QCAA English · Put your knowledge to work in context.
QCAA English is the senior secondary English subject offered by the Queensland Curriculum and Assessment Authority and completed as part of the Queensland Certificate of Education. It suits students who want to read closely, argue precisely and write analytically about how meaning is made in literary and non-literary texts. The subject develops interpretation, critical and creative response, control of textual structures and language features, awareness of context and perspective, and accuracy in written expression. Assessment combines school-based tasks with an external written examination, and the external exam is marked against a syllabus-derived instrument-specific marking guide rather than a simple pass mark. The QCAA English case studies are 5 cases and about 1,976 words.
1The Unreliable Memorial Plaque
A Year 12 student analyses a short story in which a first-person narrator, a retired museum curator, describes restoring a war memorial plaque. In paragraph two the narrator states the plaque lists 'forty-two names, every one verified'.
419 words, about 2 min2Persuasive Speech Under a Word Limit
A student writes a creative-persuasive response: a speech to a school assembly arguing that the library should stay open at lunchtime. The task requires 500-700 words and at least two rhetorical devices.
396 words, about 2 min3The Essay That Lists Techniques
A student's analytical essay on a novel contains this paragraph: 'The author uses a metaphor, a simile and short sentences. There is also personification.
415 words, about 2 min4Whose Story Is Being Told?
A student responds to a non-literary text: a 2019 travel magazine feature about a remote coastal community, written by an outsider journalist. The feature describes the villagers as 'timeless', 'smiling' and 'untouched by modernity', quotes one local shopkeeper, and includes six photographs of fishermen at dawn.
388 words, about 2 min5Grammar Fixes That Break the Argument
A student's conclusion reads: 'The novel shows that memory is unreliable, and the narrator proves this by contradicting himself. Which means the reader cannot trust anything.
358 words, about 2 min