Lesson video

Hello! My name is Mrs. Tipping, and I'm really looking forward to learning with you today all about Sumer and other early civilizations and what made them similar.

So, shall we get started? Let's go.

By the end of today's lesson, you will be able to explain how farming in Mesopotamia led to the growth of trade, writing, and building.

Before we start, I'd like to introduce you to some keywords.

We'll be using these keywords during the lesson, so it might be a good idea to write these words down.

The keywords we'll be using are: trade, record, cuneiform, ziggurat.

I'm gonna say those words again and I'd like you to repeat them after me.

Trade.

Record.

Cuneiform.

Ziggurat.

Good job.

Let's think in more detail about what these keywords mean.

Here are some definitions for each of our keywords.

People trade by buying or selling items they need or want.

People write or draw to record ideas, events, and memories.

A type of ancient writing invented in Sumer was called cuneiform.

A ziggurat is a large religious building made from stone during Mesopotamian civilizations.

Pause the video here to make a note of the keywords and when you're ready to continue, press play.

These are the learning cycles that we will be working through together in today's lesson: How did farming affect Mesopotamia? What was writing like in Mesopotamia? What were buildings like in Mesopotamia? In the first learning cycle, we'll explore how farming affected Mesopotamia.

In the Mesopotamian Civilizations like the Sumerian, farmers had excellent methods for growing crops.

In fact, their methods were so successful that they grew enough food to feed many people and even had more food than they needed.

This extra food is called having a surplus.

The success of farming had some important effects on how people lived.

One was that they could trade with other people from nearby and from far away.

Another effect was that people could invent and discover ideas because they were not always struggling to grow in a food or having to spend all their time farming.

A further effect was that having so much food meant that larger groups of people could settle and live in one place together, which led to lots of building projects.

Let's take a moment to pause and check our understanding.

What were three effects of farming in Mesopotamia? Building, trade, rivers, inventions.

Hmm, take a moment.

Have a quick discussion with your partner, what were the three effects of farming in Mesopotamia? If you said that it was building, trade, and inventions, you are absolutely right.

Well done.

Trade was particularly important for the Ancient Mesopotamian civilizations, because people would not just trade surplus food, they would also trade animals, pottery, tools, and even luxury items like jewellery.

The development of trade in Mesopotamia allowed people from many different places to meet together and share their ideas and experiences.

Take a look at that image there, an illustration showing trade in Mesopotamia.

People trading different items, food, animals, pottery, tools, and jewellery.

Let's take a moment to pause and check our understanding.

This statement, "A surplus of food led to the development of trade in Ancient Mesopotamian civilizations." Is that true or false? Have a discussion with your partner, what do you think? Is that true or false? Hmm, if you said true, you're absolutely right.

Well done.

Let's take a look at these two statements to help justify your answer.

"Mesopotamian civilizations only traded surplus food." "Mesopotamian civilizations would not just trade surplus food, but also animals, pottery, tools, and jewellery." Pause the video here, have a discussion with your partner.

Which of these two statements helps to justify your answer? And when you're ready to continue, press play.

What did you think? If you said, "Mesopotamian civilizations would not just trade surplus food, but also animals, pottery, tools, and jewellery," you're correct.

Well done.

This brings us to our first learning task of this lesson.

Can you match the words to the definitions? So what do these words mean? Trade, build, surplus, invent.

More than you need, buy or sell items people want or need, create something new, make a house or city.

Hmm, so take some time now to match the words to the definitions.

You can have a discussion with your partner about matching them, or if you'd like to you could get a pen and some paper and write each of those words out and the definitions next to them.

It's up to you.

When you're ready to continue, press play.

How did that go? Should we take a look at the matching? So, trade means to buy or sell items people want or need.

Build means to make a house or city.

Surplus, more than you need.

Invent, create something new.

Well done if you match those up correctly.

Well done for completing that learning task.

We're now going to move on to the second part of this lesson and explore what writing was like in Mesopotamia.

Trading with other people had other important effects in ancient Mesopotamia, such as the invention of writing.

The earliest writing ever discovered is from about 6,000 years ago and comes from ancient Sumer.

Archaeologists believe that writing first began because people needed a way to record what they had traded and how much they had traded.

Just take a look at that image there of a clay tablet with records of trade.

Can you see the different markings? Hmm, a different writing system to what we have today.

This earliest type of writing was just pictures of items along with simple counting marks.

And over time, the writing developed into cuneiform.

This is like an alphabet with different symbols standing for different sounds.

A bit like phonics.

Archaeologists have found cuneiform being used to write letters or to record stories.

One famous story is about Gilgamesh, an ancient king, and his adventures in Sumer.

So can you see that photo there of the story about Gilgamesh written in cuneiform? Let's take a moment to pause and check our understanding.

Writing was first invented in Mesopotamia to record stories.

Is that true or false? Hmm, take a moment, what do you think? If you said false, you're right.

Well done.

How do we justify our answer? Let's take a look at these two statements.

"The first writing recorded trade." "The first writing recorded the story of Gilgamesh." Hmm, have a discussion with your partner.

Which do you think of these two statements helps to justify your answer? What did you think? If you said, "The first writing recorded trade," you are absolutely right.

Well done.

Evidence of cuneiform writing has survived to this day.

In fact, there is more evidence of ancient cuneiform than later forms of writing on paper or papyrus.

This is because cuneiform was made using a wedge called a stylus pressed into a clay tablet to make the different marks needed.

Clay often survives for longer than paper or papyrus as it hardens over time, whereas paper and papyrus burn easily or can be damaged by floods.

Historians have been able to translate the cuneiform writing by comparing it with other languages.

Each letter was made by combining different marks, and there is a pattern to how the different marks make different numbers.

Let's take a moment to pause.

Using the words below to complete the sentences: hardens, clay, cuneiform, stylus, so can you complete the sentences here? Ancient blank writing is made by pressing a blank into tablets made from blank.

Evidence of cuneiform writing has survived to this day because clay blank over time.

So use those four words there to complete those sentences.

Pause the video here and when you're ready to continue, press play.

How did that go? Shall we take a look at where those words need to go? So, ancient cuneiform writing is made by pressing a stylus into tablets made from clay.

Evidence of cuneiform writing has survived to this day because clay hardens over time.

Well done if you got those correct.

We're now going to move on to our second learning task.

I'd like you to rewrite these sentences using modern numbers.

Use the chart to help you.

So, you can see there we've got the cuneiform numbers in the place of where we would like you to put some modern numbers.

So I am years old.

My birthday is on March, something.

There are something children in my class.

So have a look at the example of cuneiform numbers on that side.

Can you work out what each of those numbers should be in those three sentences, and can you rewrite those? Then, can you write some sentences about yourself using cuneiform numbers? So pause the video here and grab yourself a pen and some paper, and give yourself enough time to have a go at rewriting these sentences and writing your own.

And when you're ready to restart, press play to continue.

How did that go? Shall we see what the rewritten sentences were meant to be? So that cuneiform number, I am seven years old, should be in there.

My birthday is on March 17th.

There are 32 children in my class.

So each of those three cuneiform numbers turned into seven, 17, and 32.

So well done if you got those correct.

And I wonder what kind of sentences you wrote using the cuneiform numbers.

Well done for completing that learning task.

Let's move on to the final parts of this lesson.

We're going to have a look at what the buildings were like in Mesopotamia.

One effect of having successful farmers meant that large populations of people could settle to live in one place together, and this led to the first cities.

There is evidence of ancient cities in the form of ruins.

Some of these cities are 6,000 years old and the ruins have been discovered by archaeologists in Mesopotamia.

And the buildings that've been discovered include mud brick houses and other large stone buildings.

Take a look at that photo there of ancient city ruins.

How fantastic that would be to find those ruins of those ancient cities? Let's take a moment to pause here.

Can you complete the sentence to explain what you've learned? Try to include these words: farming, people, settle.

So the sentence, "Ancient Mesopotamians built cities because.

." So can you finish that sentence? Pause the video here, and when you're ready to continue, press play.

How did you get on? Let's take a look, shall we, at something you could have written.

Ancient Mesopotamians built cities because their farming was so good that they had enough to feed a large number of people who could settle in one place.

Well done if you wrote something similar.

There were many ancient cities in Mesopotamia.

They were built by rivers, all by the sea because the waters were vital for trade and farming.

So have a look at that map there that shows the ancient cities in Mesopotamia.

One important city, the City of Ur, was originally by the sea.

However, over thousands of years since it was built, the coastline has moved so the ruins of Ur are no longer by the Persian Gulf.

In the ruins of Ur, archaeologists have found many clay tablets with evidence of cuneiform writing.

Another important city that has been found by archaeologists was called Uruk.

This is the city where Gilgamesh was said to be king in the famous story.

Let's take a moment to pause and check our understanding.

Which of the following cities were ancient cities in Mesopotamia? Ur, Cairo, Uruk, Baghdad.

What do you think? Have a discussion with your partner.

Pause the video here, and when you're ready to continue, press play.

So, the following cities that were ancient cities were Ur and Uruk.

Well done if you got those correct.

One special type of building from ancient Mesopotamia is called a ziggurat.

A ziggurat was a large religious building made of stone.

So take a look at the photos there of examples of ziggurat at the city of Ur.

Ziggurats were built all in a certain style called a step pyramid.

This meant that they had different layers that were flat.

The Ancient Egyptian pyramids have smooth triangular sides, but Mesopotamian ziggurats had layers called tiers.

So have a look at that drawing there of a ziggurat showing the steps and the tiers.

So a bit of a different type of pyramid to the ones in Ancient Egypt.

Let's take a moment to pause and check our understanding.

Which picture shows a religious building from Ancient Mesopotamia? Is it A, colosseum; B, ziggurat; C, pyramid.

What do you think? Take a moment.

If you said ziggurat, you're absolutely right.

Well done.

That brings us to our final learning task of the lesson today.

Can you order these sentences to explain how successful Sumerian farming led to cities and buildings? So we've got all of these jumbled up sentences here.

We want to put them in order to explain how successful Sumerian farming led to cities and buildings.

So we've got: "Sumerians could settle in one place." "Sumerians had a surplus of food." "Sumerian farming was successful." "Sumerians built cities for many people and large stone buildings called ziggurats." So pause the video here and give yourself enough time to write out each of these sentences in the correct order to explain how successful Sumerian farming led to cities and buildings, and restart the video when you're ready to continue.

How did you get on? Shall we take a look? So, "Sumerian farming was successful," it's the first of the sentences.

So "Sumerians had a surplus of food" from that successful farming.

And then the "Sumerians could settle in one place." And so the "Sumerians built cities for many people and large stone buildings called ziggurats." So well done if you got those sentences in the correct order and for completing that learning task.

Now, there's a second part to this learning task that I would like you to have a go at.

Can you explain to your learning partner how successful farming in Mesopotamia led to the growth of trade, writing, and building? You can use the following in your explanation to help: surplus of food, record trade, cuneiform, large populations, cities and ziggurats.

So, pause the video here and give yourself enough time to explain to your learning partner how successful farming in Mesopotamia led to the growth of trade, writing, and building.

And when you're ready to continue, press play.

How did your discussions go? So, you might have said something like this.

Successful farming in Mesopotamia created a surplus of food.

This led to the growth of trade as Sumerian farmers had more food to trade and the growth of writing because writing first began as people needed a way to record trade.

This writing developed into cuneiform over time.

Successful farming also meant that large populations could settle to live in one place together, which led to the first cities and ziggurats.

Well done if you said something similar and for completing that learning task.

Before we finish this lesson, let's summarise what we've learned about the growth of trade, construction, and writing in Mesopotamia.

Successful Sumerian farming led to surplus and more trade with people from far away.

Sumerians invented writing called cuneiform to record and count items they traded.

Successful farming meant many people could settle in one place.

Sumerians built cities including large stone buildings called ziggurats.

Thank you for joining me in this lesson today, and I hope to see you in the next one.

See you there.