Teaching Sequence

Work through this resource material in the following sequence:

5 minutes

Tune In: Who is Mufasa?

20 minutes

Find Out: Poster analysis

30 minutes

Take Action: Create a poster

5 minutes

Reflection

Learning intentions

Students will:

understand that movie posters are artworks that can convey different messages about the same film
know that actions can be taken to conserve the animals featured in Disney's Mufasa: The Lion King.

Success criteria

Students can:

identify feelings and keywords being conveyed in movie posters
create an artwork to communicate a conservation message.

Tune In: Who is Mufasa?

Step 1

Begin by sharing the Visual Explainer with students, explaining this slide shows the poster for the movie Disney's Mufasa: The Lion King:

Encourage students to look closely at this poster, including any text and imagery. Ask your students, ‘Based on this poster, what would you say this movie is about? What makes you say that?’

You could then use the following as an overview of the movie:

Disney's Mufasa: The Lion King enlists Rafiki to relay the legend of Mufasa to young lion cub Kiara, daughter of Simba and Nala. The story introduces Mufasa as an orphaned cub, lost and alone until he meets a sympathetic lion named Taka - the heir to a royal bloodline. The chance meeting sets in motion an expansive journey of an extraordinary group of misfits searching for their destiny, and their bonds will be tested as they work together to evade a threatening and deadly foe.

Find Out: Poster analysis

Step 1

Explain to students that this isn’t the first Lion King movie; there was one released in 1994 and another in 2019. Both of these tell the story of Simba (the son of Mufasa) and his rise to the role of Lion King. The new movie Disney's Mufasa: The Lion King tells the story of how Simba’s father became the Lion King.

Explain that the interesting thing about storytelling is that even though the same story is often shared, the story and characters can be represented in different ways, and although the Lion King movies tell similar stories, they feel very different. Analysing the differences in the posters for these movies is an interesting way of understanding some of these differences.

Step 2

As a class, ask your students:

How does this poster make you feel?
What do you think this poster is trying to say about these animals?

Step 2

Invite students to share their responses with the class. Based on these responses, work with students to come up with at least 3 keywords that summarise the messages and feelings of this poster.

For example:

Suggested answer: This poster makes me think about how the king of the lions is proud and brave and is supported by his followers.
Keywords: proud, strength, support, courage, fearless, watchful.

Keep a record of your class’s keywords.

Step 3

Now let’s step back in time and look at the more recent release of The Lion King (2019). How does this poster make you feel? What is this poster trying to tell you? Although the colours of the poster are very similar, the positions of the animals are very different. What keywords describe this poster? Students might suggest

warmth
protection
family
pride
admiration.

Step 4

Now let’s look even further back to The Lion King (1994), the very first Lion King movie. This poster is quite different from the other two. Work with your students to create a list of keywords. This might include:

funny
family
cute
proud
love.

Ask your students to discuss what is the same and what is different between this set of posters. They might suggest:

the most recent posters use warm colours
the animation style is very different
The oldest poster and the most recent poster are more similar in their layout
keen-eyed students might point out that in the poster for Mufasa, you can see Pride Rock in the background
all three posters use the sun as symbolism. (Does the sun represent the same thing in all three posters?)

Step 5

Pose the following question:

Which movie is your favourite poster and why?
Which messages from the movie posters appeal to you the most and why?

Explain to students that for many movies, there are multiple posters that highlight the different messages within the movie. This is because different messages appeal to different people. So one poster might focus on strength and courage; another might focus on being resilient; another might focus on friends or being funny.

Step 6

The next slide shows two of the character posters from Disney's Mufasa: The Lion King. The one on the left is a young Mufasa, and the one on the right is a young Kiara (the daughter of Simba and Nala). Although they are both pictures of a young lion cub, would you still use the same words to describe both posters?

Take Action: Creating a poster

Step 1

Explain to your students that posters are a great example of how imagery can make us feel different emotions. These posters are designed to catch our attention so that we want to go see the movie, but we can also make posters that inspire us to take different actions.

Show your students the following short clip:

Mufasa The Lion King | Protect The Pride - (youtube.com/watch?v=TMgNH8rlxYM)

Although Mufasa faces the big challenges in this movie, all the animals in the circle of life are impacted by the same challenges that lions face. Just like the posters we have been looking at inspire us to see the movie, we can also make posters that inspire us to protect these animals.

Step 2

Explain to students that in this activity, they will focus on one of the animals from Disney's Mufasa: The Lion King. Have each student choose one of the following animals:

Students can work through the fact sheet and the comprehension questions individually, in pairs, or in small groups.

Literacy extension: The factsheet asks students, “What is one question you still have about your animal?” Students can build their digital literacy skills by researching the answers online.

Step 3

Provide each student with a copy of the Student Worksheet. Students will need to identify

the animal their poster will be about
the conservation action they will prompt the viewer to take
the keywords they will convey through their artwork.

Ask your students, ‘Who remembers the words written on the movie posters?’. While the text doesn’t stay in our memories, the feelings of the posters do. Your challenge is to try and convey your message through how your poster makes the viewer feel, rather than what they read. You can use some words on your poster, but keep it short and sweet!

Have students complete the Student Worksheet, with their first sketch of their poster, before moving on to create their final product.

This is a great opportunity to build on the skillsets your students are currently developing, whether that is digital media, mixed media, photography, drawing, painting etc. Direct your students to apply what they already understand about the chosen medium to this new challenge.

Step 4

Create a gallery walk (pz.harvard.edu/resources/gallery-walk) to share student posters. Give each student some sticky notes and ask them to look at each poster, and write one word to describe how the poster makes them feel, or what they think the poster represents. Have the students put the sticky notes next to the poster, and review to see if the artist’s design matched their intentions.

Reflection

Invite students to consider the following:

What did you like best about your poster?
How well do you think you managed to convey the keywords in your poster?
What would you do differently next time?

Conservation Through Art

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Summary

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