Week 4: Qin Dynasty of China (around 210 BC)

This week we headed to the Qin Dynasty in China -- when all kingdoms were united into one and the Great Wall was built! We learned how Emperor Qin Shi Huang designed his own tomb ... complete with 8,000 life-sized clay soldiers. This amazing discovery happened by accident when farmers were digging for a well!

Each soldier has a unique face, and some archaeologists believe they were modeled after actual people. Here are few of the faces:

After we talked about the clay army, we designed our own warriors -- based on ourselves. We traced our bodies and added features. 

George at work on his warrior.

Noah (L) and Hammond (R) create their warriors.

  
Off to Pompeii next week! See you then.

Week 3: Ancient Egypt 1,300 BC

This week we traveled to one of my favorite ancient cultures: Ancient Egypt! We talked about the amazing discovery of King Tut's tomb and how it helped modern people to learn about the Egyptians. 

We heard the words of Howard Carter, the archaeologist who discovered Tut's tomb:
At first I could see nothing, the hot air escaping from the chamber causing the candle flame to flicker, but presently, as my eyes grew accustomed to the light, details of the room within emerged slowly from the mist, strange animals, statues, and gold—everywhere the glint of gold.

Then the kids divided into teams to explore Tut's tomb. Each team received an image and description of an artifact ... and then our junior archaeologists got to work figuring out what each artifact was and why it was important. 

Here are the artifacts. What are your guesses?

After this activity, we all designed and made our own amulet (good luck charm) based on Egyptian symbols or our own designs. Here is mine:

 

Next, we will head east to China to learn about the Qin Dynasty and the emperor's terracotta army.

Week 2: Ancient Sumer 2,000 BC

For our second week, we traveled back in time to 2,000 BC ... to Sumer in Mesopotamia, the land between the rivers. We learned that this was the first place where people settled and built permanent cities. And, our smart junior archaeologists figured out why ... these were the first people to learn how to farm! We even got to taste one of the first foods that these people cultivated - the pomegranate. 

 We explored one of the most famous archaeological sites: the city-state of Ur, and got to see some of the treasures found in the royal tombs including the very cool (and fancy) headdress of Queen Puabi. It included 24 feet of gold ribbon!

Queen Puabi's gold headdress, found in Ur.

The Sumerians were the first to do a lot of important things. They invented the wheel, the sailboat, and written language (called cuneiform). But, they didn't invent paper so they kept all their records on clay tablets. Since only scribes knew how to write, regular people had personal cylinder seals so they could "sign" their name. The kids made their own cylinder seals and got to take home air-dry clay to make tablets just like the Sumerians. Who knows, in 5,000 years someone may find them and be curious about us!

Next week we are heading to Ancient Egypt to explore the mysteries of King Tut's tomb.

Week 1: We Dig Archaeology!

It's great to kick off another session of extended day! After we got settled and introduced ourselves, we talked about the amazing science of archaeology. Thanks to archaeologists, we are able to know about people and cultures that no longer exist.

Then, we all got out our field journals and headed outside for a simulated excavation. We noticed three levels at our archaeological site. The first level was the most recent -- and we uncovered a golden frog, a wooden musical instrument, a seashell and a paper fragment. Everyone had interesting ideas about what these artifacts meant! The next layer had a part of a bow and arrow, as well as a piece of burnt wood. We hypothesized that there had been an attack or a battle.

Mia examines an artifact -- burnt wood.
What could it mean?

Finally, we excavated the last level (which was the first civilization). We didn't have time to examine all of the artifacts from that level, so we will take another look next week and finish our field journal notes before moving on to Ancient Mesopotamia!


See you then.