Step 1: Explicit Teaching & Modelling
Name the target in child-friendly language and demonstrate one concrete example connected to audience, purpose, context.
Learning goals
1. Outcome Overview & Core Concepts
Imaginative texts entertain or explore ideas, informative texts explain or provide facts, and persuasive texts try to influence an audience.
Learning target: identify the purpose and audience of imaginative, informative and persuasive texts
Big idea: Identify who a text is for and what it is designed to do
Learning routine: Identify text type → Ask why → Ask for whom → Find evidence
4-Step Instructional Sequence
4. 4-Step Instructional Sequence
Step 2: Guided Analysis
Compare or practise a second example together. Students point to, say or show the clue.
Step 3: Collaborative / Independent Practice
Create or analyse one example together, then use a fresh familiar example independently.
Step 4: Formative Assessment
Use a one-minute check with a new example; require observable evidence rather than a guess.
Subject-Specific Content & Key Examples
2. Subject-Specific Content & Key Examples
Match text type, purpose and audience
story → entertain readersreport → inform learnersposter → persuade familieschoices suit audience
Use language, structure and images as evidence.
Notice audience choices
young childrenclassmatesfamiliescommunity visitors
Vocabulary, detail and tone change for different audiences.
Sort and notice
Sort sample texts by imaginative, informative and persuasive purpose.
Guided practice
- Sort and notice — Sort sample texts by imaginative, informative and persuasive purpose.
- Build or improve — Rewrite one message for two audiences and compare the language choices.
- Explain your choice — Use the words purpose, audience, text type to explain what you changed and why.
Curriculum Coverage & Elaborations
Curriculum Coverage & Elaborations
The content description is the required target. The elaborations below are taught as examples and contexts, not as disconnected checklist wording.
- E1: identifying the purpose of texts written by First Nations Australian authors (teaching context)
- E2: identifying the audience of advertisements and signs
Common Student Misconceptions
3. Common Student Misconceptions
- Purpose equals topic: The topic is what the text is about; purpose is what it aims to do.
- Guessing audience from pictures only: Use vocabulary, detail, design and context together.
- Answer without evidence: Point to the word, sentence, image, sound pattern or text feature that supports the answer.
Practice Thought & Formative Assessment
Practice Thought & Formative Assessment
Use a fresh, code-aligned example. The student should show the exact word, sound, sentence, image feature, audience clue or text evidence that supports the answer.
Quick checks
- What is an audience?
- What is the purpose of a report?
- How does persuasion differ?
- Can two texts share a topic but have different purposes?
Mastery evidence
- Identify imaginative purpose
- Identify informative purpose
- Identify persuasive purpose
- Identify audience
Revision Notes
Revision Notes
- Remember: Identify who a text is for and what it is designed to do
- Use the routine: Identify text type → Ask why → Ask for whom → Find evidence
- Before answering: point to the clue in the spoken words, written sentence, image, page layout or text purpose.
- Self-check: change the example slightly and see whether the same reasoning still works.
🎥 Optional Video Lesson
The SkillrHub lesson remains the primary learning resource. This optional video reinforces the explanation; you can complete the lesson and practice without watching.
Before you watch:
- Pause after each worked example.
- Try the examples yourself.
- Return to the SkillrHub lesson before continuing.
Recommended: Fiction and Nonfiction
Khan Academy Kids — Notice a difference between texts that tell imagined stories and texts that share factual information.
As you watch: Why might a reader choose a storybook or an information book?
Load video player Loads YouTube in this lesson. See the video notice below.
Try it: Choose a book for someone who wants facts about frogs and a book for someone who wants a frog adventure. Explain each choice.
Video unavailable, inaccurate or unsuitable for this year? Report a video problem to SkillrHub by email. You can continue with the written lesson and practice resources.
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Curriculum equivalents: Victoria, NSW and international
Curriculum equivalents for The purpose and audience of imaginative, informative and persuasive texts
Mapped skill: identify the purpose and audience of imaginative, informative and persuasive texts
These references identify matching or closely related learning. Curriculum sequence, terminology and depth vary, so teachers should use the mapped skill and lesson difficulty to confirm suitability.
| Region | Curriculum framework | Closest level or code |
|---|---|---|
| Australia | Australian Curriculum v9.0 | AC9E2LY03 · Year 2 |
| Victoria | Victorian Curriculum F–10 Version 2.0 — English | VC2E2LY03 · Level 2 |
| New South Wales | NSW English K–10 Syllabus (2022) | EN1-RECOM-01 · Stage 1 |
| United States (USA) | Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts | Grade 2 |
| Canada (Ontario) | Ontario Curriculum — English | Grade 2 |
| United Kingdom (England) | National Curriculum in England — English | Year 3, Key Stage 2 |
| India | NCERT / CBSE — English | Class 2 |
Australian Curriculum v9.0 is the canonical source for this SkillrHub lesson. Victoria and NSW entries name the closest published state codes or outcomes; international entries are planning references rather than claims of identical curricula.
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Topic reference: AC9E2LY03 — AC9E2LY03: Identify the purpose and audience of imaginative, informative and persuasive texts
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