We became friends with every god on Mt Olympus and met blood-thirsty creatures, such as a gorgon, cyclop, harpie, cerberus and chimera. We enjoyed reading these myths through historical fictional novels, such as “It’s all Greek to Me”.

We made connections to many of the modern stories, movies and comics that still use characters and themes from Greek mythology.

We also enjoyed Greek myths through Readers’ Theatre. We practiced reading fluently, with vocal expression, facial expression, gesture and pacing. Each group performed a different myth, including Theseus & the Minotaur, King Midas and Medusa.

As a class, we also explored the vocabulary and themes of Pandora’s Box. We each played a part and shared our video at assembly.

Grade 4 presents Pandora’s Box!

Add comments about any modern books, movies or comics you know that contain characters or themes from Greek mythology. 

They have received Honorable Mentions in an Art & Writing Competition (judged by City Weekend Kids & Parents Magazine).

Their writing and drawings will be displayed at a hotel. They will also be invited to receive their awards at a public ceremony.

Congratulations on your creative success! We are very proud of you!

Have another look at their beautiful images of the future below:

Hyun Seo dreams of living in space.

Sang Won’s futuristic world.

See this previous post for more great writing & artwork from our class:

http://blogs.biss.com.cn/sodwyer/2012/10/23/describe-the-future-in-100-words/#more-446

Over the last 5 weeks, we completed a great inquiry which involved selecting a civilisation, posing research questions, judging sources, finding and sorting out facts, making connections, writing paragraphs and producing a formal report. We’ve read millions of books, been on field trips and spoken to experts.

Finally, we designed artefacts to represent each of our research questions. We thought about where they could be found, how they would have aged and what they would tell an archeologist upon discovery. We had a wonderful time with clay, paint and a variety of found and smashed objects to create our “ancient” artefacts.

We also thought about how to explain our knowledge to an audience. We decided to make palm cards to help our memory and practiced using eye contact to communicate.

We are very thankful to the students, parents and teachers who visited our exhibition today.

We all took on the role of archeologists and used our best communication skills. It was great fun showing off our knowledge to the older and younger students. We are very proud of ourselves today.

 
Archeology Exhibition on PhotoPeach
 

What did you enjoy about the Archeology Exhibition?  What are you proud of?

What would you do differently next time?

What was your most interesting research question? What was the hardest part about research?

How are the legacies from your civilisation seen in the world today?

Our timelines needed to include:

• an appropriate, accurate scale
• dates from 3000 B.C.E. to 2000 A.C.E
• 10 significant historical events

We were given a blank piece of paper and access to all information sources and measurement tools in our classroom. We needed all our Math and research skills to complete the task.

Here we are, hard at work:

Here are some of our finished timelines:

We were marked on understanding of scale, measurement skills, quality of information, presentation and cooperation. We assessed ourselves before Ms O’Dwyer added her comments.

What did you enjoy ?  What was the hardest part?  What did you learn from this task?

Now we can compare our timelines to better understand the order, span and key legacies of each civilisation.

We were looking for the 4 great inventions of ancient China:

• paper
• gunpowder
• compass
• printing

We learned so much more! There were wonderful models, moving machines and hands-on activities. We all practiced an ancient printing technique. We also learned about how the stars were observed, how time was kept, ancient medicines, water power, trade routes, weaving machines, farming tools and iron casting. Wow! The ancient Chinese people were very advanced!

Take a look at our learning experiences:
Ancient Chinese Legacies on PhotoPeach

What did you find most interesting? Why?

What did you learn about Ancient China that you didn’t know?

Choose one legacy. Explain why it was important to ancient people. Now explain why it is still important today.

While we research the lives of ancient people, we’ve also had fun imagining the lives of future generations.

Our creative writing prompt this week came from the City Kids & Parents Magazine.

What will the world be like in 100 years?

Here are a few of our 100-word descriptions:
100 Years in the Future

Now, let’s narrow our thinking to the next decade:

• What do you hope your life will be like in 10 years?
• What do you think the environment will be like in 10 years?
• What will you do to make the world a better place over the next decade?

We spent the day at World Park, hunting for ancient architecture. With a map and a team, we navigated our way through ancient China, Rome, Egypt and Greece. We found, touched and climbed on replicas of many famous buildings. Our favorites were the pyramids, the Parthenon, the Colosseum and the Trojan Horse.

We made notes about interesting features and discussed the ratio of size between the replica and the real buildling.

We have learned that architectural legacies can be seen in many modern buildings.

 
Ancient Architecture on PhotoPeach
 

Keep reading and thinking:

Have you seen any modern buildings with Greek columns?

Why was the Trojan Horse built?

How and why did the Egyptians build pyramids?

This week, we have been looking at ancient architecture and learning about lines, angles and 2D shapes. We still use ancient Greek geometry in our art, architecture, music and games today.

In small groups, we hunted for geometry around our school. We earned a point for every mathematical legacy we could find, name and measure.

Here is a group of Geometry Hunters and their findings:

 
What did you learn about the properties of 2D shapes this week?

Why is mathematics important in architecture?

Why is mathematics important in music?

We have been poring over books, asking questions and sharing our prior knowledge. We’ve also started reading a hilarious series of adventure books called the Time Warp Trio. Historical fiction lets us meet gladiators, mummies and emperors through fascinating stories. We are excited have a set of Kindles for our classroom reading, so we can download relevant books instantly!

Here’s Hyun Seo reading a factual book:

We already love studying history!

Soon, we will begin in-depth research into a civilisation of our own choice. People might choose to explore ancient Egypt, Greece, Rome or China.

Today we learned some important vocabulary for our unit:

We also asked a big question: Why do we study history? There are so many answers to this question!

Why do you think history is an important area of study?  Why do you find history interesting?