HIV and AIDS English Project

ENGLISH PROJECT CREATED BY K-J LOWTHORPE

HIV and AIDS

This project is aimed at Year Eight and Year Nine pupils.

AIMS -

To raise awareness of HIV and AIDS risk to general public;
To reduce the rate of infection in general public;
To dispel common myths through education.

TASK:-

Create an advertising campaign to heighten awareness of HIV and AIDS. Create letter persuading local MP to fund its broadcasting on television. Carry out market research on public to gauge current knowledge. Use ICT to improve presentation and quality of work.

Teacher's Notes for project.

Lesson One - The pupils need to find out the correct information about HIV and AIDS. Either: find out from the Internet; create a Facts Sheet, and develop questions from this; discuss the facts, perhaps with the starting point of current awareness in the class.

Lesson Two - Create a Market Research questionnaire to test the current awareness of the public. This could be word-processed. The research could be carried out for homework.

Lesson Three - Begin to plan your advertising campaign. Consider: target audience; lighting; special effects; music; setting; voice-overs; characters; script, etc.

Lesson Three - Plan out your advertisement in the form of a storyboard. Illustrate.

Lesson Four - Write a letter to your local MP to persuade him: of the importance of raising awareness in England; to fund your campaign.

Lesson Five - Collate all research, storyboards, planning, etc with your letter as a package. Word-process your package.

Lesson Six - Discussion options. Role-play.

HIV and AIDS Fact Sheet

For every person who knows that they are infected with HIV, there is at least one more who is unaware that they have the disease. The disease has no outwardly visible signs - you cannot tell by looking at a person if they have HIV.

Originating in Africa, HIV is a disease which destroys the immune system. Your immune system protects you against common diseases by building up anti-bodies which fight off infection. If you have been infected with HIV, your body's ability to protect you from disease is reduced. Once your immune system is badly damaged, (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome), AIDS, sets in, resulting in slow and painful death.

Anyone of any age can contract the HIV virus. Unprotected sex and sharing needles are the two biggest causes of the spread of the virus. If body fluids of an infected person are transferred to an uninfected person, the risk is extremely high.

Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) cannot survive outside of the body. This is the reason that you cannot contract the virus by shaking hands, hugging, sharing bath water, drinking from the same glass, toilet seats, even kissing, etc, as some people believe.

There is no known cure or vaccination against HIV. It only takes a second to contract the virus - the result is permanent and fatal. The contraction of HIV in heterosexual people is higher than the rate of infection in homosexual people and drug addicts.