September 11-17, 2014 Current Events Lesson Plan
Current Event: Stonehenge Reconsidered
Researchers are using ground-penetrating radar and other advanced imaging techniques to “see” underground and map the landscape surrounding Stonehenge in unprecedented detail. This work has revealed long-buried features showing that Stonehenge was part of a larger ceremonial center. The researchers have found features belonging to as many as 60 other prehistoric structures surrounding the site. These features include 17 small henge-like shrines, 20 burial pits, and 4 burial mounds over an area of more than 4.5 square miles (11.6 square kilometers). These new findings will allow researchers to reconstruct how ancient peoples used Stonehenge.
Objective:
Stonehenge is an ancient ruin on the Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, southwestern England, consisting of huge, rough-cut stones set in a circle. Archaeologists think that the ancient inhabitants of the region constructed the site, using it as a gathering place and religious center. Stonehenge was built in three phases over about 1,500 years beginning around 3100 B.C. The monument consists of a huge circle of dark volcanic bluestones, weighing up to 4 tons (3.6 metric tons), that is surrounded by a ring of huge gray sandstones, weighing up to 25 tons (23 metric tons). The outer circle surrounding the bluestones measures 108 feet (33 meters) in diameter. Stonehenge’s center contained five archlike stone settings and a large altar stone. Through the years, the huge stones gradually fell, and people took some stones to make bridges and dams. However, scholars have learned what the site looked like by studying the positions of the stones still in place. The Behind the Headlines news story and related World Book articles explore Stonehenge and other archaeological topics.
Words to know:
Discussion Topics:
1. Ask your students to name some ancient civilizations. (Students might say the Assyrians, Babylonians, Chinese, Egyptians, Greeks, Persians, Phoenicians, Romans.)
2. Ask your students to name some famous people who came from England. (Students might say Jane Austen, Geoffrey Chaucer, Sir Winston Churchill, Oliver Cromwell, Charles Darwin, Charles Dickens, Elizabeth II, Stephen Hawking, Henry VIII, Sir Isaac Newton, J. K. Rowling, William Shakespeare, Jonathan Swift, Queen Victoria, William Wilberforce.)
3. Ask your students if they would rather live in ancient or modern times. Have them explain why.
4. Ask your students to use World Book’s Timelines feature to view or add to the World History: c. 9000 B.C. to 1000 B.C. timeline. (Students may wish to use World Book’s History of the world article for help.)