AC9E3LA08
Official content description
understand that verbs are anchored in time through tense
What AC9E3LA08 actually looks like when you teach it
Tense is one of those things children use correctly in speech long before they control it in writing, so the teaching job is mostly about consistency rather than concept. The common problem in Year 3 narrative writing is drifting: a recount that starts in past tense and slides into present partway through, usually at the exciting bit. Highlighting verbs in their own drafts is more useful than any exercise, because the drift is invisible to them until the verbs are marked. Irregular past forms need separate, explicit attention.
What the class will get wrong — and what to do about it
The error
Regularising irregular past tense verbs — "runned", "catched", "goed". This is a sign the child has learnt the rule, not that they've failed to.
How to confront it
Say so out loud: the rule they applied is a good rule, and these words are older than the rule. Keep a running class list of irregular pairs on the wall and add to it whenever one appears in reading.
Ready to put on the board
We are learning to keep verb tense consistent in our writing.
- I can find the verbs in a piece of writing.
- I can say whether a text is written in past or present tense.
- I can check my own writing for tense that changes partway through.
Highlight the verbs
- Model on the board with a short paragraph you've written that deliberately changes tense halfway.
- Highlight every verb. Ask the class to spot where it shifts.
- Children highlight the verbs in their own current draft.
- Beside each verb they write P for past or N for present. The drift becomes visible.
- Fix one paragraph. Add any irregular past forms they needed to the class list.
Free to use in your classroom. Written for AC9E3LA08, not adapted from another year level.
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The Year 3 English planning scaffold
A one-page planning sheet with the official achievement standard, every content description grouped by strand, and space for your assessment and week-by-week sequence. Print it and plan on paper, or use it as the skeleton for a unit.
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What Year 3 English students should achieve
Coverage is judged against the achievement standard — not by ticking every content description. These are the official Year 3 English standard sentences this code builds towards:
- They write texts using letters that are accurately formed and consistent in size.
- They group, logically sequence and link ideas.
- They use text structures including paragraphs, and language features including compound sentences, topic-specific vocabulary and literary devices, and/or visual features.
- By the end of Year 3, students interact with others, and listen to and create spoken and/or multimodal texts including stories.
- They create written and/or multimodal texts including stories to inform, narrate, explain or argue for audiences, relating ideas including relevant details from learnt topics, topics of interest or texts.
- They use language features including topic-specific vocabulary, and/or visual features and features of voice.
The Language progression either side of AC9E3LA08
A class can only meet this descriptor if they were taught the one before it. If yours hasn't, that's where the lesson starts — not here.
Taught before · Year 2
- AC9E2LA01investigate how interpersonal language choices vary depending on the context, including the different roles taken on in interactions
- AC9E2LA02explore how language can be used for appreciating texts and providing reasons for preferences
- AC9E2LA03identify how texts across the curriculum are organised differently and use language features depending on purposes
Builds towards · Year 4
- AC9E4LA01explore language used to develop relationships in formal and informal situations
- AC9E4LA02identify the subjective language of opinion and feeling, and the objective language of factual reporting
- AC9E4LA03identify how texts across the curriculum have different language features and are typically organised into characteristic stages depending on purposes
Other Year 3 Language codes
- AC9E3LA01understand that cooperation with others depends on shared understanding of social conventions, including turn-taking language, which vary according to the degree of formality
- AC9E3LA02understand how the language of evaluation and emotion, such as modal verbs, can be varied to be more or less forceful
- AC9E3LA03describe how texts across the curriculum use different language features and structures relevant to their purpose
- AC9E3LA04understand that paragraphs are a key organisational feature of the stages of written texts, grouping related information together
- AC9E3LA05identify the purpose of layout features in print and digital texts and the words used for navigation
- AC9E3LA06understand that a clause is a unit of grammar usually containing a subject and a verb that need to agree
- AC9E3LA07understand how verbs represent different processes for doing, feeling, thinking, saying and relating
- AC9E3LA09identify how images extend the meaning of a text
Content description and achievement standard © Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA), Australian Curriculum Version 9, used under CC BY 4.0. TeachKoala is not affiliated with or endorsed by ACARA.