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Archaeologists Puzzle Pieces
Learners identify how archaeologists use typology to interpret artifacts. They interpret sample artifacts as if they discovered them.
Smithsonian Institution
Watching Crystals Grow
Amazing science can sometimes happen right before your eyes! The class gets cozy as they watch crystals grow. They use Epsom salts, rocks, and food coloring to create crystals. They'll observe the entire process, documenting every step...
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Archaeology Vocabulary Sampling
Students predict how many words out of ten they accurately define. They match the definitions to the correct vocabulary words and make a bar graph showing how many definitions were matched to the correct words. The write their group...
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Lesson plan: Archaeology - Its Methods and Use
Students study the field of archeology. In this archeology instructional activity, students participate in 12 activities that require them to examine archeology, garbology, artifacts, ethical issues, and field specific vocabulary.
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Experimental Archaeology: Making Cordage
Students make a cordage and use an activity sheet to experience a skill that ancient Native American in North Carolina neded for everyday life.
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Archaeology of the Future
Students view pictures of classmates' homes, make list of different objects in picture, and discuss what they can tell about place from evidence in picture. Students then observe artifact pictures, and read and complete artifact chart.
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Archaeology
Students read archaeology books, define it and discover how math and science help us learn about the past. In this investigative lesson students give a description of archaeology and two facts that they learned.
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Archaeology as a Career
Fourth graders read about archaeology as a career. They develop a list of questions they would like to ask an archaeologist and then actually interview an archaeologist on the future of archaeology as a career.
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"How to Think Like an Archaeologist" - Suggested Pre-Visit Activity For Historic Jamestown
Learners examine how archaeologists use artifacts to explore other people and their cultures. They discuss types of artifacts, analyze receipts for clues, and discuss how what the items bought reflect about people.
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Mapping the Bone Field: An Area and Scale Exercise
Here is an excellent cross-curricular lesson. Learners relate multiplication to area by making a grid on graph paper, and then creating the same grid in real space outside in the school yard.
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National Marine Sanctuaries Shipwrecks
Junior oceanographers access the Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary Shipwreck Database and plot the locations of several shipwrecks. Shipwrecks are always an enthralling subject and this activity allows your learners to act as...
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Inventions Over Time
Explore the inventions of the past with a project on ancient tools. After reading an article about hunting during the Archaic period, the Late Prehistoric period, and the Historic period, kids fill in a cause-and-effect chart about the...
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Artifacts 1: What Can We Learn From Artifacts?
Sixth graders are introduced to artifacts and explore an online archaeological site to connect clues about how people once lived. In this deductive reasoning lesson, 6th graders participate in the stratigraphy game on Kids Dig Reed.com...
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Dig It Up
Students participate in an archaeological excavation to determine how archeologists make inferences about various cultures. They reconstruct the site using layers of drawings. They discuss the kinds of information they learned.
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Excavate and Explore
Students simulate an archeological excavation to explain how archeologists identify, date, and make inferences about their findings. They explain the importance of spatial and stratigraphic contexts in archaeology.
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We Really Dig Archeology and Palentology
Sixth graders examine the differences between archeology and paleontology. Using the internet, they explore the tools and techniques used in each field. They must use the correct tools to uncover and record the objects they find. They...
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Inference Makes the Difference
Students explore how archaeologists make inferences from artifacts to explore what life was like in the past. In this archaeology lesson, students work in groups and make inferences about an imaginary household based on modern day...
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Layers of The Past
Sixth graders identify methods archaeologists use to date soil layers. They interpret soil profiles and discuss the examination of soil at a dig site. They discuss texture and color of soil.
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Lesson plan: History Underfoot
Students study Native Americans of Virginia. In this Virginia history instructional activity, students take on the role of archaeologists as they analyze a site and its artifacts. Students use the information to draw conclusions about...
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Indians in Georgia: How Do We Know What We Know?
Students discover archaeology by investigating the history of Native Americans in Georgia. In this U.S. history lesson, students participate in a mock archaeological excavation in their classroom by recovering artifacts and drawings...
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Methods of Collecting Information
Third graders examine a bag or box of soil containing items that they dig for. Their task is to become detectives to make conclusions about the area from which the items came as real archaeologists do.
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Looking At An Object
Students observe the attributes of an object, infer their uses, and discover how archaeologists use objects to explore the past.
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Sand & Water: Shape Search
Students act as amateur archaeologists as they participate in their own "dig" to explore and record unusual shapes. In this shape exploration lesson, students use trowels and shovels to dig, and learn to sift the dirt with screens to...
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Forensics: Who Killed the Iceman?
Students explore how archaeologist examine mummies. In this research based lesson, students work in groups to research two mummies and report their findings to the class through role-playing and using a model of the mummy.