Core Skills Analysis
English: Literature and Visual Literacy
The child engaged with *The Rabbits*, written by John Marsden and illustrated by Shaun Tan, experiencing a story told through both words and images. The child could explore how the text and illustrations worked together to communicate ideas, and how visual details such as colour, composition and perspective contributed to meaning. The book’s allegorical storytelling offered opportunities to consider how authors and illustrators represent events and viewpoints. This supported close attention to how literary and visual choices shape a reader’s interpretation.
History and Civics
The child encountered a picture book that uses rabbits as symbolic characters to portray colonisation and its effects on the original inhabitants of a land. This provided a way to consider how stories can represent historical encounters, changes to communities and relationships with place. The child could reflect on whose perspective is shown and how a historical account may affect different groups. The activity connected literature with discussion of Australian history and the importance of listening to First Nations perspectives.
Visual Arts
The child explored Shaun Tan’s illustrations as an important part of the book’s storytelling. Looking closely at the images could support noticing how scale, colour, setting and visual contrast created mood and suggested meaning. The child could consider how an illustrator communicates ideas that may not be stated directly in the written text. This encouraged visual interpretation and appreciation of picture-book illustration as an art form.
Tips
Tips Invite the child to choose one illustration and describe how its colours, scale and composition influence the mood, then compare that interpretation with a partner’s. Create a two-column response showing what the words communicate and what the images add, and discuss where the two work together or create a contrast. Explore the book’s allegory alongside a reliable, age-appropriate source about colonisation in Australia, centring First Nations voices and distinguishing the fictional symbols from historical accounts. Finish with a reflective response in which the child explains how the story shaped or complicated their understanding of perspective, place and historical representation.
Book Recommendations
- The Rabbits by John Marsden and Shaun Tan: An allegorical picture book whose text and illustrations invite discussion of colonisation, perspective and the effects of historical change.
- The Arrival by Shaun Tan: A wordless graphic novel that uses detailed illustrations to explore migration, change and the experience of a new place.
Learning Standards
- Australian Curriculum: English — AC9E5LE03: Discuss how language features, images and vocabulary influence interpretations of literary texts; connects to examining the relationship between Marsden’s words and Tan’s illustrations.
- Australian Curriculum: English — AC9E6LE03: Analyse how text structures and language features work together to meet the purpose of a text; connects to considering the book’s allegory and combined verbal and visual storytelling.
- Australian Curriculum: The Arts (Visual Arts) — AC9AVA6E01: Explore where, why and how visual arts are created and shared; connects to interpreting how the illustrations communicate ideas and mood.
- Australian Curriculum: History — Year 5, ACHASSK107: The nature of convict or colonial presence, including the effects on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples; connects to the book’s allegorical representation of colonisation. This is a conceptual connection, not evidence that the activity covered the full standard.
Try This Next
- Illustration investigation: sketch one scene and label how colour, scale and composition guide the reader’s attention.
- Perspective prompt: write a short response explaining how the story might feel different when told from another character’s viewpoint.
- Words-and-images chart: record one idea communicated by the text and one added by the illustration.
- Discussion cards: ask, “What might the rabbits symbolise?” and “Whose perspectives should be included when learning about history?”