Activity One - Mapping

(Thank you Mrs. Davison for this lesson)

As you are now aware it is really important to have knowledge of the physical landscape of an area to understand how people can interact differently with each other. Your task is to map the area of Ancient Greece so that we have some knowledge of the area that we are about to investigate. Before you start you need to consider what you need to include on your map by completing the bullet point below.

• We have looked at mapping skills before so write in your book the things that every map needs. Hint you should have five things written down.

Now collect an A3 sheet of plain paper and place it on your table in a landscape position. Draw your outline box using a pencil and ruler and now draw the following things.

1. Draw a sketch map of Ancient Greece.
2. Add the island of Crete to your map.
3. Mark on a few of the other islands to show that Greece is made up of a mainland and many islands.
4. Highlight on your map the low lying land, hilly and mountainous areas. These should be coloured differently and then put in the key.
5. Mark on any rivers you can identify.
6. Label the Mediterranean Sea, the Ionian Sea and the Aegean Sea on your maps.
7. Label the Peloponnese peninsula (in the south).
8. Label the Chalkidike peninsula in the north (where Thessaloniki is located).
9. Add the main cities and key locations of ancient Greece - Athens, Sparta, Mycenae, Platea, Eretria, Thermopylae, Olympia, the island of Salamis. Knossos on the island of Crete.
10. As we did for Ancient Egypt write a series of information boxes describing how the landscape influences what people can grow and where they live.

Activity Two - Listen

Before we get started on the questions below, listen to the summary song of why ancient Greece is so important to our history. Write down the ideas of the importance in the padlet below.

Activity Three - Record

Now you have drawn your map of Ancient Greece you can clearly see that it is located in Southern Europe close to Asia and Africa. To the east is the Aegean Sea, to the west is the Ionian Sea and to the south is the Mediterranean Sea. The country is mainly made of one large mainland and two smaller peninsulas. Greece is largely mountainous and this impacts the variety of weather found there. The physical environment my influence the types of food, housing and work that people did. The technology developed may also have been influenced by the environment.

A society is a group of people sharing a culture and it is held together by a social structure. Language is crucial for decoding these structures and for passing on information to the next generation.

Religions and belief systems help people to make sense of the world. They are important source for values as well as to show different cultures through history. The ancient Greeks had a pantheon of gods that they believe in.

You now have a good idea of where Ancient Greece was located and what the physical geography of the area was like. As you know from the Bronze Age Cities work, the landscape and climate had a huge impact on the specialisation of each city-state. Answer the questions below using full sentences and paragraphs. Remember a paragraph is approximately made up of 5-7 sentences. It is important to add detail and examples.

1. How might the ancient Greeks have used the sea?
2. How might the topography (shape of the land) have affected where people settled? HINT - think back to your Bronze Age Cities work.
3. How do you think the people in ancient Greece interacted with their environment? Use the words in the text box titled 'Interaction with the environment' to help you.
4. Define the word pantheon.
5. Write a summary of why the gods were important to ancient Greek life.