THE RABBITS

John Marsden and Shaun Tan

Published 1998

John Marsden (the author) lives in Victoria where he is the

Principal of Candlebark School, he has written thirty or so
books and is arguably one of the most respected novelists for
young people (Booktopia 2017).

Shaun Tan (the illustrator) has his honours in Fine Arts and
English Literature, now best known for ‘illustrated books that
deal with social, political and historical subjects through
• surreal, dream-like imagery’ (Booktopia 2017).

This resource is an allegory depicting the effects of colonisation. It is brilliantly illustrated by

Tan which effectively can cater for lessons in junior primary through to high school. It is a
powerful picture book utilising strong symbolism to evoke emotion and empathy in the
reader. The white rabbits represent the British and European invaders, and the marsupials
represent the indigenous people. This story does not just apply to Australia – the same
experience is known to have been inflicted on many indigenous people the world over.

The student knowledge, understanding and skills that will be developed through the
utilisation of this resource will include: A) Literacy skills, as the children will be eager to
express and communicate their ideas and emotions once they have been exposed to the
compelling themes and images in this book. B) The students will use their critical and creative
thinking in group work and class discussions; they will be scaffolded in their analyses and
evaluation of the information they will be exposed to. C) The use of this resource should
contribute to the building of ethical understanding and intercultural understanding (personal
values, honesty, resilience and empathy are all themes included within the pages of this
book). ‘Intercultural understanding encourages students to make connections between their
own worlds and the worlds of others, to build on shared interests and commonalities’ (ACARA
2017). The important concept of sustainability will be addressed through the use of this
resource as it instrumentally highlights the bond between the land and the indigenous
animals in the beginning through to the mass population of the rabbits and the ‘strange
animals’ until the land was desolate.

I believe this lesson will come in the analysing stage of the unit plan. I would like to present
the students with approximately 3 lessons pertaining to Aboriginal Dreamtime stories. The
meanings and symbols as described the background information. Language groups and how
the Indigenous people lived in perfect harmony with their environment. The fact that some
of their practices were an integral part of the ecological system ensuring continuity. At this
stage, I envisage the questioning and research component to be accomplished and for the
students to really start analysing the effects and more complex repercussions of our country’s
colonisation. This resource should contribute to the analysis of the guiding inquiry question.
How has our community changed? What features have been lost and what features have
been retained?

To develop an engaging and creative pedagogy the students should be able to relate to the
resource. The Rabbits is wonderful as it provides many levels across many age groups for the
students to relate through their background knowledge, their connectedness to the world,
and country in which they live, family, home and the natural environment (Groundwater-
Smith, Ewing & Le Cornu2015).
An example of a lesson could be: once the book has been read as a class, we could engage in
a class discussion. I could then ask them to do a jigsaw exercise where they find people who
felt or thought similar ideas about the book as them. We could then regroup as a class and
each group report back about how they felt. I could then ask the students individually to
create their own picture books based on their understandings, such as: a) empathy regarding
how the Indigenous people would have felt when the Europeans took their land or b) when
the land was lost through ‘development’. This will encourage higher order thinking. The
students will have the opportunity to learn from each other and share their ideas then
communicate them in a book of their own. This will have cross-curricular links to Art and
English.

There are many strengths to this resource and many opportunities to design engaging
thought-provoking lessons from junior primary through to high school. There are no
weakness as any opportunity to openly talk about Australia’s beginnings is a good
opportunity. There is still so much hurt and confusion surrounding our history. Adaptations
would need to be made with regard to the complexity of the exercise you ask the children to
complete as a result of engaging with this resource. The lessons exercises will need to be
pitched in the ‘zone of proximal development’ (Vygotsky 1987)

Cross-curricular priority: Sustainability ‘for students to develop an appreciation of the

necessity of acting for a more sustainable future and so address the ongoing capacity of Earth
to maintain all life and meet the needs of the present without compromising the needs of
future generations’ (ACARA 2017).