Exploring Ancient Cultures Class Summary 5/12/14

with Kim Rodgers

Warriors and Walls

The last couple of weeks our class has been studying Ancient China. We read about the terra cotta warriors, which were found by farmers digging a well in 1974. 

Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of China, wanted to protect himself after death, so he had an entire army constructed of life-size models of warriors, chariots, and horses. About 2,000 have been found, but it is estimated that there are up to 8,000. Incredibly, every warrior has unique facial features, hairstyles, and dress. The students created their own warrior and painted it with bright colors, just like the original warriors!

---

This week we read about the Great Wall of China, learning how 1,000,000 people were involved in its construction with many dying in the process, buried within the wall itself. 

The students stood in a line with their arms outstretched, to make their line as long as possible. We measured it and calculated that we would need almost a million and a half of that same distance to get close to the length of the wall. That was still hard to picture, so we took the figure of 5,500 miles, which is the most common figure for the length of the wall, and converted that to inches. We used string to measure out 458 feet. Next week we plan on taking that string outside to see how big of an area we can create using this measurement.

---