Embedded Files
Essential Questions:
Essential Questions:
How do we study the past?
How does geography impact the development of civilizations?
Overview for parents:
Overview for parents:
World History in 6th Grade begins with an introductory unit covering the following topics: Social Studies skills, Early Humans, Geography, and Mesopotamia. Students will learn expectations for the course, have their abilities in reading and writing initially assessed, and build a skill set that can be applied throughout the course.
This unit serves as a foundation to introduce students to the content, and begin building skills for the course as a whole. Students will learn how humans transitioned from nomadic hunter-gathers to settled agriculturalists in Mesopotamia, and will use the earliest civilizations as a context to explore geography and social studies skills.
Overview for Students:
Overview for Students:
Early Humans
Our class starts in prehistory, or the time period before writing was invented. Most of human existence actually took
place in prehistory, but we only get glimpses of what happened back then because no one ever wrote anything down! To learn about people in Prehistoric times, scientists called archaeologists search for artifacts. Artifacts are physical things like cave-paintings, bones, ancient tools, old buildings, treasures, weapons, and so on. Archaeologists use artifacts to draw conclusions, make inferences, and take educated guesses about what life may have been like for ancient people. The more evidence you can find (we call evidence taken firsthand from the past Primary Source Evidence), the clearer picture we can make of the past.
The time period our class starts in is called the Paleolithic Age, which comes from a Greek word meaning 'old stone'. During the Paleolithic Age, humans lived as hunter-gatherers. Hunter-gatherers meet their needs by moving from place to place to find food, avoid danger, and keep warm. They lived their whole lives without permanent homes.
They also weren't alone. Another species of human called Neanderthals (named after the Neander valley, where the first bones of this species were discovered) lived during this time period as well. Neanderthals and Cro-Magnon's (early modern humans), shared the earth for thousands of years until the Neanderthal's disappeared. We don't know what happened to the Neanderthals, but archaeologists think that they were probably out-competed by modern humans.
History & Geography Skills
History & Geography Skills
History: The story of humans in the past. A written account of past events.
Archaeology: The study of humans in the past through physical remains (artifacts).
Geography: The study of places and the relationships between people and their environments.
In our class we learn to think like historians, archaeologists, and geographers. To understand the past, historians and archaeologists use Primary and Secondary source evidence. In our class we will learn about each type of source, and how they can be used to understand the past.
It's also very important for us to learn about Geography. The places we study will have a huge impact on the people who live there. It's no accident that the first cities were built in the near East, and it's not just lucky that Egyptian civilization developed without much threat from outsiders. It was the mountains and islands of Greece that led to the rise of independent city-states like Athens and Sparta, and the plains of modern day Iran that led the Assyrians to build one of the most fearsome armies in the ancient world. The where matters a lot, and by understanding the places people come from, we can better understand the things they did.
We will base or study of geography on 5 Themes.
1) Location
2) Place
3) Region
4) Movement
5) Human-Environment Interaction
Agriculture and the Beginnings of Civilization
Agriculture and the Beginnings of Civilization
After the Paleolithic age came the Neolithic Age. The word Neolithic comes from a Greek word which means 'new-stone', so the Neolithic Age just means the New Stone Age. The biggest thing that happened during this time period was the invention of Agriculture (farming). Farming and the taming of animals allowed people to stop being hunter gatherers, and start settling and living in one place. This change might seem small, but I think it's the MOST IMPORTANT CHANGE IN HUMAN HISTORY!!! Without agriculture and all the things that came with it, human existence would have been very, very different.
In class we will look at the chain of advancements that the invention of farming set into motion.
Agriculture (Farming) >> Permanent Settlements >> Food surpluses >> Specialization of labor >> Trade >> Written language >> Organized governments, religions, social structures...All of these things were set into motion by the invention of farming, and without them we would't have civilizations.
Civilization: A complex society with cities, governments, writing systems, laws, and social classes.
Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia
The first civilizations started in a place called Mesopotamia. Mesopotamia comes from a Greek (are you sensing a trend???) word which means 'the land between rivers'. Located in modern day Iraq, Mesopotamia is the land between and around the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. Mesopotamia and the surrounding area is also sometimes called the Fertile Crescent, but it's not very fertile anymore.
We will focus our learning on a few of the civilizations that started and grew from this area. It's important to know that even though these people came from similar places, their civilizations could be very different, and each was most powerful during different times in history.
Each of these tags is a link to a great site with information about these Mesopotamian civilizations!
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