Wearable text Lesson plan for Year 9 © Commonwealth of Australia, 2010, except where indicated otherwise. You may copy, communicate and modify this material for non-commercial educational purposes provided you retain all acknowledgements associated with the material.

Class discussion Do you wear clothes such as T-shirts that have any text on them? Is this text simply the branding of the manufacturer or does it have a message of some kind? Can you think of any groups in society that use clothes to convey a particular message about themselves to the world? Do you think this approach is an effective form of communication?

T-shirts The following three T-shirts are in the collection of the National Museum of Australia.

Reproduced courtesy of the National Museum of Australia

Small group analysis In your group, focus on one T-shirt. What is the message? Elaborate on what the words, symbols etc mean. (You may need to research the issue that the design represents.) What other icons or symbols does the T-shirt reference? How does the design enhance or add to the message? Who do you think this T-shirt would appeal to? Does it speak to a particular audience? If so, how and in what ways?

Individual book work Consider all three T-shirts. Do you think these T-shirts are aimed at a mass market or specific groups of people? Do you think their effectiveness depends entirely on how many are sold? Would the wearers of these T-shirts necessarily be politically-minded? Explain your reasons. Which of the three T-shirts do you consider to be the most persuasive? Explain your reasons. Why do you think the Museum collects T-shirts like these?

Design project As a class: 1.Brainstorm the kinds of writing that you have seen on clothing. 2.Sort them into two lists – ‘messages’ and ‘brands’. 3.Think about an issue that is affecting your school or your community. 4.Come up with some text that you might wear on a T-shirt to inform people or promote your issue. Consider what factors will make this text as persuasive as possible.

Design project On your own or in pairs: Think about an issue you are interested in. What message would you like to convey about it? Design a T-shirt. Think carefully about the style you will use. How will you make it persuasive? What imagery (pictures, colours, symbols) will you use? Produce your design via Zazzle.Zazzle

Curriculum links Year 9 English Language Expressing and developing ideas: Understand that visual texts can be multi-layered and complex and that the use of symbols and icons augment meaning of print in multimodal texts Literature Responding to and creating texts: Experiment with different structures, modes, media and language features to create imaginative and playful literary texts for particular purposes and effects. Literacy Texts in context: Analyse how texts have been or are created and interpreted within the context of other texts and are influenced by cultural perspectives Interpreting, analysing, evaluating: Purpose and audience: Interpret, analyse and evaluate texts critically for different perspectives Explore and explain the combinations of language and visual choices that authors make to present information, opinions and perspectives Creating texts: Create imaginative, informative and persuasive texts that present a point of view, advance or illustrate arguments