STAGE

EDIT425 — Learning: The Next Generation · UNE 2026

From Page to Stage

Multimodal Storytelling in Drama and English — a proposal for AI-literate, embodied, human-centred learning in NSW secondary classrooms.

Year 9/10 · Stage 5 Drama & English NSWEduChat Flipped Learning Project-Based Learning

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AI Literacy Disclosure

This resource was developed with AI assistance as a demonstration of the critical, purposeful AI use it advocates for in students. All pedagogical decisions and arguments remain the author's own.

Author

Damzelin McGrath

Unit

EDIT425 — Innovations in Pedagogy & Technology

Institution

University of New England

Trimester

Trimester 1, 2026

Context

NSW Public Secondary — Stage 5

Section 01 — Current Context

Where We Actually Are

The classroom reality, the policy landscape, and the gap this proposal addresses.

Australian secondary education sits at a genuine inflection point. AI tools have arrived in classrooms faster than professional confidence to use them well. The question is no longer whether to integrate — it is how to do so with pedagogical rigour.

85%

of teachers don't believe AI will take their jobs (Atomi, 2024)

60%

are worried about the ethical implications of AI in education (Atomi, 2024)

58%

saw a jump in student engagement when AI was integrated into lessons (Atomi, 2024)

43%

of students already use AI tools like ChatGPT for their learning (Businessolution.org, 2023)

The Policy Landscape

Australia has moved decisively. The Australian Framework for Generative AI in Schools (Department of Education, 2024) and the National AI Plan (2025) together signal that structured, responsible AI integration is national policy. The Framework is explicitly listed as a current government action under the Plan's "Spread the Benefits" pillar.

By 2026, the implementation of AI in Australian classrooms has moved past the "ban or allow" debate and into a structured, pedagogical phase guided by the Australian Framework for Generative AI in Schools.

Research summary, March 2026

National AI Plan (2025) — Education Actions

Framework for Generative AI in Schools — active and curriculum-aligned
NBN expansion to regional and remote areas — equity in connectivity
$460M+ committed to AI, including Next Generation Graduates Program
GovAI sovereign platform — same logic as NSWEduChat: Australian-hosted, safe for public institutions
2030 target: Australian workforce fully AI-capable across all sectors, including education

The Classroom Reality

Infrastructure and policy are ahead of teacher confidence. This is the historically consistent pattern in edtech adoption — the tool arrives before the pedagogy to use it well. Research consistently shows teachers need concrete, subject-specific models of AI integration, not generic guidance.

The Tension

Teachers have access to AI tools but lack pedagogically grounded frameworks for using them in subject-specific ways. Professional development has not kept pace with policy rollout.

The Opportunity

Drama and English teachers are uniquely positioned to model AI literacy — because students can physically experience the difference between AI output and genuine human expression.

Why Drama and English?

These subjects share a foundational concern: authentic human voice. Drama makes this visible and embodied — students can feel in their bodies the difference between a scripted line and a genuinely felt one. English makes it textual — students learn to hear the difference between a manufactured paragraph and a crafted one.

Students will use AI regardless. Honest acknowledgment and structured integration is more useful — and more ethical — than prohibition.

Core principle — this proposal

The Gap This Proposal Addresses

This proposal is not simply a lesson plan. It is a professional learning model — a worked example of what principled, subject-specific AI integration looks like for Drama and English teachers who have the tool (NSWEduChat) but are uncertain how to build pedagogy around it.

Section 02 — About the Lesson

The Proposed Lesson

An overview of the lesson, its learning intentions, and the three-mode AI framework at its core.

This proposal presents a cross-KLA lesson sequence for Stage 5 Drama and English students that uses AI as a tool for preparation and brainstorming — while protecting class time for embodied, human-centred making.

Year Level

Year 9 / 10 — Stage 5

KLAs

Drama & English (cross-curricular)

Unit Focus

Multimodal Storytelling — From Page to Stage

Duration

6-week unit, 3 × 60-minute lessons per week

Context

NSW Public Secondary School

Assessment

Performance + Multimodal Presentation + Reflection

The Core Argument

Drama and English teachers are uniquely positioned to lead AI literacy education in schools. Students in these subjects can physically and aesthetically experience the difference between AI-generated output and genuine human expression — in voice, in body, in word choice, in vulnerability.

Deliberately removing students from technology during performance and making work is a pedagogical strength, not a gap. The contrast is the lesson.

Core design principle

The Three-Mode AI Framework

Students engage with AI across three distinct modes, each with different levels of authorship and agency:

1📖

Scripts Learnt

AI as Resource

Students use NSWEduChat to research, gather context, and generate starting material. AI is the source. Critical evaluation is the skill.

2✍️

Scripts Devised

AI as Collaborator

Students use AI output as raw material — rewriting, rejecting, shaping. The human voice emerges through the act of editing and embodying.

3🎭

Designed

Human as Author

Students create original work. AI cannot perform, cannot feel ensemble, cannot take a risk on stage. This is where the human learning lives.

Learning Intentions

Storytelling across modes: Students can translate a narrative idea from written text into a performed, multimodal form.
AI literacy: Students can articulate the difference between AI-assisted and human-authored work, and make deliberate choices about when to use each.
Prompt engineering as language skill: Students can write precise, purposeful prompts — the same clarity required in English analysis and Drama direction.
Critical evaluation: Students can assess AI output for quality, bias, and authenticity — not accept it uncritically.
Ensemble and embodiment: Students can take a text through the body — voice, physicality, relationship — in ways AI cannot replicate.

Section 03 — Innovative Pedagogy

Pedagogy Above Technology

The pedagogical frameworks that ground this proposal — and why they work together.

Technology is chosen to serve pedagogy — never the other way around. This proposal is built on three interlocking frameworks: Flipped Learning, Project-Based Learning, and Constructivism, with Drama pedagogy providing the embodied, human-centred core.

Pedagogy above technology is the foundational principle. Any technology chosen must earn its place by serving a specific pedagogical purpose.

EDIT425 Course Framework, UNE 2026

Flipped Learning

Bergmann & Sams
2012

Flipped Learning inverts the traditional lesson structure: direct instruction and content exposure happen before class, freeing face-to-face time for higher-order application, collaboration, and making. In this proposal, AI-assisted brainstorming and research happen outside class — while class time is protected for performance, ensemble, and embodied creative work.

Application in this lesson

Students use Flip (video platform) to submit a short pre-class reflection on their AI-assisted preparation. They arrive having already done the cognitive groundwork — leaving class time for the irreplaceable human activity of making and performing together.

Project-Based Learning

Thomas
2000

PBL places students at the centre of an extended, authentic inquiry that results in a real product or performance. Students work toward a meaningful goal — a multimodal storytelling performance that moves from written text to staged embodiment. The project is the curriculum, not an add-on.

Application in this lesson

Students develop original multimodal narratives using AI as a thinking tool, Canva for visual presentation, and live performance for the embodied culmination. The project is assessed holistically — process, product, and reflection all count.

Constructivism

Piaget · Gardner
Vygotsky · Heathcote

Constructivism holds that learners build knowledge actively through experience. Gardner's multiple intelligences, Vygotsky's Zone of Proximal Development, and Heathcote's Drama pedagogy all share this conviction: real learning happens through doing, making, and reflecting — in relationship with others.

Application in this lesson

AI generates a starting point. Students must work with it, against it, or beyond it — building understanding through the act of critical engagement. Heathcote's teacher-in-role approach frames the teacher as a co-maker, not an instructor dispensing knowledge from above.

Drama Pedagogy — Embodied Learning

Heathcote · Bolton
O'Toole

Drama's unique pedagogical contribution is embodied cognition — learning that lives in the body, not only in the mind. When students perform, they are not illustrating understanding: they are generating it. The risk, vulnerability, and presence required in performance cannot be replicated by an AI tool.

Why Drama is uniquely suited to AI literacy education

Students can feel in their bodies the difference between reading an AI-generated line and investing in a genuinely felt one. This embodied knowledge of authenticity is the most powerful AI literacy lesson available — and it happens through Drama, not despite it.

How These Frameworks Work Together

Flipped + PBL

Flipped learning creates space for deep project work. Students don't spend class time on content delivery — they spend it making. PBL gives that making time purpose and direction.

Constructivism + Drama

Both demand active knowledge-building. Drama pedagogy is constructivism made physical — students literally construct meaning through action, not abstraction.

All Frameworks + AI

AI fits the flipped preparation phase; it scaffolds PBL without replacing the making; it provides raw material for constructivist critique; and it fails at embodiment — which is the lesson.

Kalantzis & Cope (2010)

The teacher-as-designer frames the entire proposal. The teacher's role is to design learning experiences — selecting pedagogy and technology with intentionality, not convenience.

Section 04 — Innovative Technology

Three Tools, One Purpose

Each technology is chosen to serve a specific pedagogical role — and none replace the human work at the centre.

Technology selection follows the TPACK principle: tools must align with the content being taught, the pedagogy being used, and the specific technological context of the classroom. Three tools are chosen — each earning its place by doing something the others cannot.

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NSWEduChat

Generative AI · NSW DoE · Free for all NSW public school students Yr 5–12

NSWEduChat is the NSW Department of Education's purpose-built generative AI tool, available to all public school students in Years 5–12. It is curriculum-aligned, age-appropriate, and hosted on Australian government infrastructure — solving equity, safety, and privacy concerns simultaneously.

In this lesson, NSWEduChat is used outside class time for the flipped preparation phase: brainstorming, research, initial drafting, and prompt engineering practice. Students learn to interrogate its output, not accept it.

Why this tool, not ChatGPT

NSWEduChat addresses UNESCO's equity concern directly — all students have access regardless of family income. It requires no parent account, no subscription, and no device beyond what the school provides. It is the only AI tool appropriate for mandated classroom use in NSW public schools.

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Flip

Video Platform · Formerly Flipgrid · Microsoft · Free for educators

Flip is a short-form video platform designed for education. Students record brief video responses and share them within a closed class community. The asynchronous video format is the delivery mechanism for the flipped learning component.

Before each class, students submit a 60–90 second Flip response documenting what they asked NSWEduChat, what it produced, and what they decided to keep, change, or discard. This creates a visible trail of critical thinking the teacher can review before class.

Pedagogical function

Flip makes the preparation phase assessable and visible. It also develops metacognitive capacity — articulating thinking on camera requires clarity. For Drama students especially, it builds comfort with being seen and heard: a foundational performance skill.

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Canva

Multimodal Design Platform · Free for students and educators

Canva is a browser-based design platform students use to create multimodal presentations — combining image, text, layout, and in some cases audio or video. Students use Canva to build a "story bible": visual mood boards, character sketches, scene layouts, and the written narrative draft that becomes the performance text.

Canva is the bridge between the written/AI phase and the performed phase — translating ideas from page toward stage through visual and design thinking.

Multimodal literacies connection

Kalantzis and Cope (2010) argue that contemporary literacy requires competence across multiple modes — linguistic, visual, spatial, gestural, and audio. Canva operationalises this. Students are not decorating their work; they are thinking through design.

TPACK Alignment

Mishra and Koehler's (2006) TPACK framework asks: does the technology serve the content and the pedagogy simultaneously? Each tool passes this test:

NSWEduChat

Serves flipped learning (pedagogy) + brainstorming/research (content) + AI literacy (new content)

Flip

Serves flipped delivery (pedagogy) + metacognitive reflection (content) + oral communication (Drama/English outcomes)

Canva

Serves PBL product creation (pedagogy) + multimodal storytelling (content) + visual design thinking (media literacy)

Equity and Infrastructure Viability

All three tools are free. NSWEduChat is provided by the NSW DoE — no additional cost to school or family. The National AI Plan's NBN expansion to regional and remote areas ensures connectivity is not a barrier. This proposal is viable across all NSW public school contexts — metropolitan, regional, and remote.

Section 05 — Lesson Plan

The Lesson In Detail

Click any step to expand. Prompt library appendix below.

Year Group

Year 9/10 — Stage 5

Duration

60 min + flipped prep

KLAs

Drama & English

Technology

NSWEduChat · Flip · Canva

Pedagogy

Flipped + PBL

Before ClassFlipped Preparation — Home / Independent~30 min

Students log into NSWEduChat and use a provided starter prompt to generate ideas for their multimodal story. They are directed to interrogate the output — asking follow-up questions, pushing for specificity, rejecting clichés.

Starter prompt (provided to students)

"I'm a Year 10 student working on a multimodal storytelling project. Give me five unusual story concepts about [theme: identity/belonging/justice] that would work both as a written narrative and a short performance piece. After each one, explain what makes it dramatically interesting."

Students must document: what they asked, what they received, and what they chose to keep or change.

Students record a 60–90 second Flip video responding to three questions: What did you ask NSWEduChat? What did it give you? What are you going to do with it — keep, change, or discard — and why?

Assessment note

These Flip videos are the primary evidence of the flipped learning phase. They are reviewed before class, allowing the teacher to tailor in-class discussion to real student thinking.

Students open their Canva story bible template and add their chosen concept, a rough synopsis (3–5 sentences), and one image or visual reference that captures the mood. This is a thinking tool, not a polished product.

Template provided

Teacher provides a shared Canva template with sections: Story Concept / Synopsis / Mood Image / What AI Helped / What I Decided / Performance Notes.

During ClassThe Lesson — Embodied, Human-Centred Making60 min

Students arrive and devices go away. The teacher has reviewed the Flip videos and selects 2–3 examples of interesting student thinking as discussion springboards.

Whole-class question: "You all had AI help you prepare. You all got different things. Why?" Brief discussion — 3–4 minutes. The point is to activate curiosity, not resolve the question.

Teacher move

Deliberately name the contrast: "For the next 50 minutes, you have no AI. What you make is entirely yours. At the end, we'll talk about the difference."

10 minutes of physical and vocal warm-up thematically linked to the unit. Students move through the space as if carrying something heavy, something fragile, something invisible. Teacher calls out transitions. Then in pairs: one reads an AI-generated line, the other responds with the first honest thing they feel.

Why this matters

This activity sets up the lesson's core discovery: AI generates language. Bodies generate meaning. Both have a place — but they are not interchangeable.

In small groups (3–4 students), students take their story concept from the flipped prep phase and begin staging it. They have 20 minutes to produce a 2-minute performance fragment. The only rule: it must include a moment of genuine stillness and a moment of genuine movement.

Teacher circulates, asking one question per group: "Where is the human decision in this scene that AI couldn't make for you?"

Scaffolding for lower-confidence groups

Provide a simple dramatic structure: Arrival / Conflict / Choice. Groups slot their content into this frame.

Groups share their fragments. Audience uses a structured response protocol: one thing that surprised them, one question it raised, one moment where they saw a genuine human choice.

The critical question

"Could AI have made the choice you made in that moment?" The answer is almost always no — and that "no" is the most important learning in the lesson.

5 minutes to update their Canva story bible — adding a note capturing one choice they made in the performance that went beyond what AI gave them.

Exit ticket

Complete this sentence — "AI helped me with ___. It couldn't help me with ___ because ___."

After ClassExtension & ConsolidationFor next lesson

Students complete their Canva story bible — all sections, including a 200-word written narrative draft that will become the basis for their final performance. They may return to NSWEduChat to refine language or develop character, but must document what they kept and what they changed.

Three-mode framework self-assessment

Students label each section: Scripts Learnt (AI-sourced), Scripts Devised (AI-started, human-shaped), or Designed (wholly human-authored).

NSW Syllabus Outcomes

EN5-1A

Responds to and composes increasingly complex and sustained texts for understanding, interpretation, critical analysis, imaginative expression and pleasure

EN5-2A

Effectively uses and critically assesses a wide range of processes, skills, strategies and knowledge for responding and composing in all modes and media

DR5-1

Develops and sustains characters, situations, roles and dramatic action in their own drama and in the dramas of others

DR5-5

Demonstrates an understanding of drama by applying knowledge, skills and techniques to engage an audience through performance

Appendix — Teacher Prompt Library

Ready-to-use prompts for Drama, English and Media Studies teachers. Replace [bracketed text] with your specifics.

Drama

I'm teaching Year 9 Drama. We're beginning a devised theatre unit exploring [identity/justice/belonging]. Generate three warm-up activities that build ensemble skills and connect to the theme, suitable for a 60-minute lesson with no prior drama experience assumed.

I have 60 minutes with a Year 10 Drama class who have just seen [performance/film]. Design a structured reflection and response lesson connecting what they saw to their own devised work, including at least one physical/movement activity.

English

I'm teaching Year 10 English. We're analysing [text title] for its representation of [theme]. Design a lesson sequence with three activities that move from comprehension to analysis to evaluation, aligned to NSW Stage 5 outcomes.

I need to introduce the concept of [technique/concept] to Year 9 English students with no prior knowledge. Give me an engaging hook activity, a brief explicit teaching segment, and a short practice task — all within 20 minutes.

Media Studies

I'm teaching Year 9 Media. Students are creating a 60-second persuasive video on [topic]. Give me a scaffolded production planning activity that helps them make deliberate choices about audience, code, and convention before they film.

Design a critical analysis lesson for Year 10 Media on [advertisement/film clip/social media post]. Include guided questions that move students from surface observation to ideological analysis using semiotics and audience theory.

I have a Year 9 Drama class with three EAL/D students and one student with selective mutism. Suggest modifications to a performance assessment task that maintain rigour while allowing equitable participation for all students.

Take this Year 10 essay task: [paste task here]. Rewrite it at three levels — extended support, standard, and extension — without changing the core outcomes being assessed. Keep each version to one page.

I have a mixed-ability Year 9 Media class. Design a production task on [topic] that allows both highly technical students and beginners to demonstrate Stage 5 outcomes at an appropriate level.

I have a Year 9 student who is a strong analytical thinker but has significant writing difficulties. Suggest three alternative ways they could demonstrate their understanding of [text/concept] that are still rigorous and assessable.

I'm assessing a Year 10 Drama performance against these criteria: [paste criteria]. Draft five feedback templates — one for each grade band — that are specific, actionable, and written in language appropriate for a 15-year-old.

Here is a student's draft essay introduction: [paste text]. Give me targeted feedback identifying one strength, one structural issue, and one language-level improvement. Write it in a tone that encourages revision, not discourages effort.

A student submitted this artist statement about their media production: [paste text]. Give me feedback addressing their justification of creative choices, use of media terminology, and clarity of argument. Under 150 words.

I have 28 Year 10 English essays to mark on [text/topic]. Give me 8 reusable feedback phrases — 4 for strengths and 4 for areas of growth — that I can combine without sounding repetitive or generic.

Write three report comment variations — A, B, and C grade — for a Year 9 Drama student assessed on ensemble performance and contribution to devised work. Keep each under 75 words, aligned to NSW Stage 5 Drama outcomes.

I need to write semester reports for 28 Year 10 English students. Give me a bank of 10 varied opening sentences — some on analytical skill, some on creative writing, some on improvement — that I can mix and match without sounding repetitive.

Write a report comment for a Year 9 Media student who shows strong conceptual understanding but consistently fails to meet production deadlines. Honest but constructive, under 75 words.

Write a report comment for a Year 10 Drama student who is highly creative and enthusiastic but has poor punctuality and incomplete written reflection tasks. Acknowledge strengths without glossing over concerns. Under 80 words.

Draft a professional email to a parent explaining that their Year 9 student is falling behind in [subject] due to incomplete work. Tone: collaborative and solution-focused. Suggest one practical next step. Under 200 words.

Write a note to my Head Teacher explaining why I've chosen to use AI tools in my [Drama/English/Media] classroom. Brief, professional justification under 200 words, referencing pedagogy, student outcomes, and school policy alignment.

A parent has contacted me concerned their child is using AI to complete assessments. Draft a response explaining how I use AI as a purposeful learning tool in class, and how my assessments are designed to require genuine student thinking.

Section 06 — References

References

APA 7th Edition. All sources cited in this proposal.

AI Disclosure Note This proposal was developed with AI assistance (NSWEduChat and Claude) for drafting, organisation, and prompt development. All academic sources were verified independently. AI-generated content was not cited as a primary academic source. This disclosure is consistent with the AI literacy principles this proposal advocates for in students.

Policy & Government

Australian Government Department of Education. (2024). Australian framework for generative AI in schools. Commonwealth of Australia. https://www.education.gov.au

Australian Government Department of Industry, Science and Resources. (2025). National AI plan. Commonwealth of Australia. https://industry.gov.au/NationalAIPlan

NSW Department of Education. (2024). NSWEduChat: Generative AI for NSW public school students. NSW Government. https://education.nsw.gov.au

UNESCO. (2023). Guidance for generative AI in education and research. United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. https://www.unesco.org

Pedagogy & Learning Theory

Bergmann, J., & Sams, A. (2012). Flip your classroom: Reach every student in every class every day. International Society for Technology in Education.

Heathcote, D., & Bolton, G. (1995). Drama for learning: Dorothy Heathcote's mantle of the expert approach to education. Heinemann.

Kalantzis, M., & Cope, B. (2010). The teacher as designer: Pedagogy in the new media age. E-Learning and Digital Media, 7(3), 200–222. https://doi.org/10.2304/elea.2010.7.3.200

Mishra, P., & Koehler, M. J. (2006). Technological pedagogical content knowledge: A framework for teacher knowledge. Teachers College Record, 108(6), 1017–1054.

Thomas, J. W. (2000). A review of research on project-based learning. The Autodesk Foundation.

Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes. Harvard University Press.

AI in Education

Abrams, Z. (2025, January). AI in education: Benefits, challenges and the path forward. APA Monitor on Psychology. American Psychological Association.

Common Sense Media. (2024). AI and the future of learning: Survey of US teens. Common Sense Media.

CSIRO. (2024, November 25). Everyday AI: Artificial intelligence in education. CSIRO News. https://www.csiro.au

Goldstone, A. (2026). AI as a scaffold, not a shortcut: Kyron learning and the future of adaptive instruction. Faculty Focus.

US Department of Education, Office of Educational Technology. (2023). Artificial intelligence and the future of teaching and learning: Insights and recommendations. https://www.ed.gov/ai

Wang, S., Wang, F., Zhu, Z., Wang, J., Tran, T., & Du, Z. (2024). Artificial intelligence in education: A systematic literature review. Expert Systems with Applications, 252, 124167. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eswa.2024.124167

Multiliteracies & Technology

Cope, B., & Kalantzis, M. (Eds.). (2000). Multiliteracies: Literacy learning and the design of social futures. Routledge.

Jenkins, H. (2009). Confronting the challenges of participatory culture: Media education for the 21st century. MIT Press.

Weller, M. (2019). 25 years of Ed Tech. Athabasca University Press. https://doi.org/10.15215/aupress/9781771993050.01