E1 Exploring ideas and setting a Learning Goal: SACE Activating Identities and Futures
“E1 Exploring ideas related to an area of interest: develop agency by setting a Learning Goal, exploring a topic of your choice and planning an Output of Learning that has purpose and value for you, others and/or the community”
E1 is about exploring an area of personal interest and shaping it into a focused Learning Goal with purpose and value, plus a planned Output of Learning. Higher grades come from organising ideas and making discerning, justified choices about the direction of your learning, recorded as natural evidence in your Portfolio.
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What this criterion asks
E1, Exploring ideas related to an area of interest, is where AIF begins. You choose an area of personal interest, explore it, and shape it into a Learning Goal with an Output of Learning. The subject outline's learning requirement is to "develop agency by setting a Learning Goal, exploring a topic of their choice and showcasing their Output of Learning". E1 is assessed mainly in the Portfolio (AT1).
The answer
From interest to Learning Goal
- Start broad: list interests, problems you care about, skills you want, and ideas for your future.
- Explore: read, watch, talk to people, try things. Record what you find.
- Focus: turn the interest into a goal that is specific, achievable in the time, and valuable to you, others and/or the community.
- Plan an Output of Learning: decide how you will showcase your progress (a plan, proposal, demonstration, product, report, video, oral explanation).
- Personal: you care about it.
- Purposeful: it has value for you, others or the community.
- Focused: specific enough to guide your choices.
- Achievable: realistic within a 10-credit subject.
- Output-ready: it leads naturally to an Output of Learning.
What the performance standards reward
| Grade | E1 standard |
|---|---|
| A | Organises ideas and makes discerning choices about the direction of the learning |
| B | Purposefully explores a range of ideas and connects them to progress the learning |
| C | Explores and builds on ideas related to an area of interest |
| D | Collects information related to an area of interest |
| E | Describes an area of interest |
The difference between levels is direction: higher grades show you organising ideas and deliberately choosing where your learning goes.
A student interested in photography:
- Explore: watches tutorials, joins a local camera club meeting, looks at the work of three photographers, and takes practice shots.
- Organise: groups ideas into portrait, landscape and documentary photography.
- Choose: decides documentary photography suits their interest in their town's history, and records why.
- Learning Goal: "To learn documentary photography techniques to create a photo essay of local businesses that have operated for over 50 years, for display at the town library."
- Output of Learning: a 12-image photo essay with captions.
- A goal that is just a topic
- "Climate change" is a topic; a Learning Goal says what you will learn or achieve.
- Choosing something you already know how to do
- There must be real learning.
- Artificially curated Portfolios
- Keep authentic, natural evidence as you go.
Practice questions
Original practice questions graded from foundation to exam level, each with a full worked solution. Try them before revealing the solution.
foundation3 marksImprove this Learning Goal so it is focused and has clear purpose: 'I want to learn about cooking.'Show worked solution →
Improved example: "To learn to plan and cook five nutritious, low-cost dinners so I can take over two family meals a week and share the recipes with the school's senior students who are moving out next year."
Why it is better: it is specific (five dinners, nutritious, low-cost), it has purpose and value for the student, their family and others, and it suggests an Output of Learning (a recipe booklet or a cooking demonstration).
Marking guide: 1 mark for focus, 1 mark for stated purpose or value, 1 mark for a goal that leads to a clear output.
core4 marksDescribe four types of evidence you could collect in your Portfolio to show you explored ideas related to your area of interest.Show worked solution →
- Mind map or brainstorm of possible directions, with the ones you chose circled and a note on why.
- Annotated articles or videos with notes on what each added to your thinking.
- Voice notes after talking to someone with experience in the area.
- Photos of early attempts (sketches, prototypes, trial recipes) with a short caption on what you learned and how it changed your direction.
Each shows not just what you found but how it shaped your choices, which is what E1 rewards.
Marking guide: 1 mark per relevant evidence type with its link to exploring.
exam6 marksExplain how a student could move from a C-level to an A-level demonstration of E1 during the first term of AIF.Show worked solution →
The C standard is "Explores and builds on ideas related to an area of interest"; the A standard is "Organises ideas and makes discerning choices about the direction of the learning".
At C level the student gathers and extends ideas, for example reading about electric bikes and noting interesting facts.
To reach A level, the student should:
- Organise ideas: group findings into themes (cost, safety, local laws, maintenance) in a visual map.
- Evaluate options: compare three possible directions (building a bike, a buying guide for students, a campus e-bike proposal) against criteria such as value to others, feasibility and interest.
- Make and justify a discerning choice: choose the campus proposal because it helps more people and is achievable, recording the reasons in the Portfolio.
- Refine the Learning Goal as new ideas emerge, showing deliberate steering rather than drifting.
This shows agency: the student is not only collecting ideas but directing the learning.
Marking guide: 1 mark for the C standard, 1 mark for the A standard, 3 marks for specific actions that show organising and discerning choices, 1 mark for linking to agency.