How To...Create a Culture Study Guide

For Reproducible click here. PDF 428KB

In these first days of the new school year, as you get your students ready to do teaming activities and discuss the rules and management aspects of your classroom culture, the discussion can lead into the things that we learn from the artifacts of a culture.

You can take cues from the variety of cultures represented in your classroom to learn more about each other and those ancient civilizations represented in your core content. You can also integrate coordinate pairs in math and a study of map coordinates.

Artifacts reveal culture
Here's a way to help students learn about their classmates while they role-play archaeologists who study artifacts. Students will need three copies of the Artifacts Record worksheet on the next page – one copy on which to record their personal Artifact Bag selections, one to use in the classroom Artifact Bag "dig" and one on which to analyze the ancient civilization of their choice.

Take pictures of your classroom work areas and ask students to use them to identify "artifacts" that tell them about the people who use each area and what they do there. This can lead to a discussion about the rules for each work area.

One of the first homework assignments for your students (and their families) can be an Artifact Bag that shows their own personal culture. Students choose five artifacts to place in the bag based on things that are important to them – interests, people, hobbies. Students will come to realize that the way in which a person lives is his or her culture.

Students should fill out an Artifacts Record to explain their choices and leave their Artifact Bags unlabeled. Collect the bags, assign an ID number to each one and randomly place them on a grid that you've made on your classroom floor. Students can study the artifacts and identify which classmate belongs to each Artifact Bag.

Fill in your grid and reveal the answers. You can review coordinate pairs by playing a "Who's Who" guessing game: "Whose bag can be found on A-3?" "What artifact helped you figure out the person at C-4?"

Primary students will love using artifacts to learn more about their classmates. In grades 4-8, this activity can be a jumping-off point for an in-depth study of any culture.

Breaking the surface
Begin your artifacts study with a visit to OLogy at www.amnh.org/ology and select "Archaeology: Clues from the Past." Archaeology is just one of the science topics the American Museum of Natural History offers as in-depth collections of resources for exploration. Two interactive explorations – "Inca Investigation" and "Zapotec Urn" – present artifacts from ancient cultures. "What's the Big Idea" guides students to learn about how archaeologists study artifacts. The "Tools of the Trade" game lets students work with archaeology tools.

Digging up resources
There are many other resources on the web for studying artifacts and archaeology. The University of Minnesota's eMuseum features three "floors" of virtual museum all about archaeology. You'll want to visit the third floor Resource Room for the Lesson Plan Bank and Concepts and Terms. www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/emuseum1.html

At BLM Learning Landscapes, the "Explorers" link lists various research topics, including archaeology, with dozens of links for in-depth exploration. www.blm.gov/education

Community Archaeology Program is a comprehensive collection of links for virtual tours of digs throughout the Americas. The Basic Stuff about Archaeology is a great class resource. www.binghamton.edu/cap/dirtsurf.html#basic

Odyssey Online uses artifacts to study the Near East, Egypt, Greece, Rome and Africa. carlos.emory.edu/ODYSSEY/

History Firsthand's unit lessons and extension activities guide the understanding of artifacts and using primary source materials to study cultures in the elementary classroom. memory.loc.gov/ammem/ndlpedu/lessons/97/firsthand/main.html

For Reproducible click here. PDF 428KB

Linda K. Lindroth is Technology Editor and Web Coordinator for Teaching K-8. She is also a Technology Resource Teacher in a K-5 computer lab in Lexington, KY.