Sue McPherson's "Grace Beside Me" teachers' review

Brief description and distinctive features

Distinctive features of Grace Beside Me:

• The title, Grace Beside Me, links to Grandma’s gentle spirit and First Nations belief in the importance of listening, valuing calm and peace 
• Told in the first person through the perspective of Fuzzy Mac
• Authenticity of rural NSW with recognisable places like Batlow, Tumbarumba, Adelong
• Engaging examples of Connection with People and Country 
• An excellent and valuable Postscript about how many children have grandparents as guardians.
• Chapters have titles and are about 7-12 pages, which propels the pace of reading. 
• Insights to experiences of First Nations injustice, dispossession, challenge  including Missions, Stolen Children, inequity for returned soldiers.  
• A trailer for the television series is available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YoFftAkN5Qo
• The 13-part series can be viewed on SBS on Demand and on ABC iView. ATOM (Australian Teachers of Media) has created a Study Guide and the DVD is available to purchase. 
• Grace Beside Me is also available as an E-book. This format is very useful for teachers as it enables quick and efficient ways of capturing extracts for close study.

Ways to use Grace Beside Me in the classroom

At some point in this unit of work revisit student understanding and knowledge of First Nations culture and history, Cara Shipp’s resource in Reading Australia provides some very accessible notes on this area as well as excellent teaching ideas on the novel’s style, plot, use of motif, character and themes.

Characters

The characters in Grace Beside Me are very authentic and have an engaging sense of the real. There are main characters and a wide range of secondary characters which give us insights about people who live in the town. 

Form small groups and students to choose a character to explore: 

• Fuzzy
• Nan 
• Pop
• Sonny Boy

Each group to construct a table for their character and identify five words to describe their character:

Share tables and discuss if there are any other experiences in the text which could be added to the table.

Individually students are to choose two characters and use the evidence from the tables to respond to one of these questions:

Engaging with the people in a story is the best way to learn about humanity.
With close reference to two characters in Grace Beside Me, respond to this statement. 

OR

In what ways did the characters in Grace Beside Me contribute to a deeper understanding of yourself and the connections we make to others and to our world? 

Students as Writers

• Revisit discussion of the relationship of Fuzzy with her Nana and Pop and how relationships with “significant others” is an important element of our well-being.
• Encourage discussion in small groups and whole class about the people in the students’ lives who are significant to them.

Students to choose one of the following topics to write a vignette which explores this topic. Considerations for writing: 

• You can change the person or activity to suit your own situation e.g. Fishing with pop could be Playing football with my brother
• Choose the first or third person to write in 
• Be sure to create an authentic setting
• This is not a complete story but a snapshot of a person and their experience or moment which captures the essence of the person involved.
• Perhaps Include a photograph
• Write about 300-500 words
• Edit your writing to ensure you have created a convincing vignette
• Write a short biography (50 words) about yourself as the writer in the third person and mention your interests. Consider including a photograph of you in a place you love. 

Collate the class writings into a collection with a title. Each student could be given a copy and be encouraged to read others’ stories.

Topics:

• Fishing with pop
• Enjoying Nan’s cooking
• What pop taught me
• What I tell my aunt that I can’t tell mum
• I used to visit our neighbour every afternoon after school
• Uncle never missed a game 
• Nan had this habit of …
• I see my eyes when I look at the photo of …

Relevant details in relation to the new English 7-10 syllabus

Text requirements: Grace Beside Me is a novel, by an Australian Indigenous author, which explores how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander authors convey connections between Culture and identity. As an Indigenous author, Sue McPherson presents a range of experiences and perspectives of Indigenous people and culture and specifically through figurative language, meaning is shaped.
Looking for more classroom texts for Stage 4 students? Browse our Year 7 texts and study guides and Year 8 texts and study guides at Five Senses Education.

Concepts could include Narrative • Character • Perspective. 

Relevant NSW English 7-10 Syllabus content

Reading viewing and listening to texts 

Uses a range of personal, creative and critical strategies to read texts that are complex in their ideas and construction EN4-RVL-01

• Explore the main ideas and thematic concerns posed by a text for meaning
• Engage with the ways texts contain layers of meaning, or multiple meanings
• Explain personal responses to characters, situations and issues in texts, recognising the role of written, oral or visual language in influencing these personal responses
• Explain how the use of language forms and features in texts might create multiple meanings
• Using a range of texts, describe how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander authors convey connections between Culture and identity
• Read texts selected to challenge thinking, develop interest and promote enjoyment, to prompt a personal response
• Read a variety of texts that present a range of perspectives and experiences, including those of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples, and respond in a range of ways, including sustained written responses where appropriate
• Understand the ways reading helps us understand ourselves and make connections to others and to the world
• Discuss and reflect on the value of reading for personal growth and cultural awareness
• Reflect on how reading promotes a broad and balanced understanding of the world and enables students to explore universal issues
• Reflect on own experiences of reading by sharing what was enjoyed, discussing challenges to strengthen an understanding of the value of reading

Understanding and responding to texts A

Analyses how meaning is created through the use of and response to language forms, features and structures EN4-URA-01

• Analyse how figurative language and devices can represent ideas, thoughts and feelings to communicate meaning
• Explain how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander authors use figurative language and devices to shape meaning
• Analyse how engaging characters are constructed in texts through a range of language features and structures, and use these features and structures in own texts
• Understand narrative conventions, such as setting, plot and sub-plot, and how they are used to represent events and personally engage the reader, viewer or listener with ideas and values in texts, and apply this understanding in own texts

Understanding and responding to texts B

A student examines and explains how texts represent ideas, experiences and values EN4-URB-01

• Consider the influence of cultural context on language
• Explore how specific elements of languages and dialects, including Standard Australian English, Auslan, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Languages, and Aboriginal English, can shape expressions of cultural context in texts

Expressing ideas and composing texts A

A student creates personal, creative and critical texts for a range of audiences by using linguistic and stylistic conventions of language to express ideas EN4-ECA-01

• Create imaginative texts for creative effect and that reflect a broadening world and relationships within it
• Create imaginative texts using a range of language and structural devices to drive the plot, develop characters, and create a sense of place and atmosphere

(English K-10 Syllabus 2022 © NSW Education Standards Authority for and on behalf of the Crown in right of the State of New South Wales, 2023)

Connecting texts