Hello, welcome to today's history lesson.

My name is Ms. Roberts, and I'll be your teacher today.

This is a lesson about the ancient Greek civilization.

Today we are going to think about what we know about ancient Greece, and how do we know what we know? So, are you ready? Let's get started together.

By the end of the lesson today, you will be able to write an account of ancient Greek history and culture that best represents what ancient Greece was like.

Let's start by looking at some keywords for today's lesson.

Keywords are important words that we will use today, and these are words that you will soon be able to use yourself when you are talking about how historians have helped us learn about ancient Greece.

The first keyword is generalisation.

Can you say generalisation? Well done.

It's a little bit tricky that one, isn't it? Our second keyword is account.

Can you say account? Well done, let's look at the meanings of those words to together.

First of all, we had the word generalisation.

Now, a generalisation is when you say something that is not specific to a certain group of people, place, or time.

It is a general statement.

I'm just, yeah.

Our first keyword was generalisation.

A generalisation is when you say something that is not specific to a certain group of people, place, or time.

And our second keyword is account.

An account is not a bank account in this context.

In terms of history, an account is one version of events that may have happened in the past.

We're going to find out more about generalisations and about accounts later in this lesson.

Today's lesson has got two parts.

First of all, we're going to think about what we know about ancient Greece.

And second, we will think about how we know what we know about ancient Greece.

So, let's begin by discovering what we do know about the ancient Greek civilization.

Firstly, we know a lot about the geography of ancient Greece, and how the people of ancient Greece were organised.

We know that ancient Greece was divided into separate areas called city-states.

The ancient Greek word for city-states were polises.

A city-state was all the land and the people in one specific area that were ruled by one major city.

Three of the most important city-states in ancient Greek history were Athens, Sparta, and Corinth.

And you can see the locations of those cities on the map.

The city-states of ancient Greece were not always friends.

In fact, they spent a lot of time at war with each other.

For example, Sparta and Athens in particular were known to be great rivals, and they actually spent 25 years fighting each other in a battle called the Peloponnesian War.

This is a map showing how ancient Greece was divided into those separate city-states.

We know that there were many differences between the city-states.

For example, from looking at the map alone, you can see that the city-states were different sizes.

And within those different city-states, there were many different types of landscape and weather.

There were also differences between the people of the city-states as well.

The people would specialise in different things and have different skills.

So, for example, because it was on the coast, the people of Athens were often seafarers.

People in Messenia were very good at farming, and Spartans were known as being some of the best fighters in ancient Greece.

As well as those differences, there were also some similarities between the city-states of ancient Greece as well.

Most of the cities in ancient Greece had lots of the same buildings in them.

So, for example, each city would've had at least one large agora, or marketplace.

There were also numerous temples, there would've been a gymnasium, and at least one theatre in each of the major cities, like Athens, Corinth, and Sparta.

Gymnasiums were places where the men could go to exercise, but also to hold important debates.

Theatres were places where the ancient Greeks went for entertainment, and they would watch plays that were usually tragedies or comedies.

The photograph is the ruins of a theatre in Athens, called the Herodeon.

The highest point in each major Greek city was fortified, and it was called the acropolis.

Often on the acropolis, a big temple would be built.

In Athens, a very famous temple exists called the Parthenon.

The ruins of the Parthenon are one of the most popular tourist attractions in the world today.

Quiz time now, have you been listening closely to all of this information about ancient Greece? I'm going to read four statements.

Only one of these four statements is correct, which one? Statement A, ancient Greek city-states were all equal size.

Statement B, a polis and a city-state are the same thing.

Statement C, Corinth is an example of an ancient Greek colony.

Statement D, ancient Greece had temples called agoras.

Which of those statements is correct? Have a think now, and make your choice.

Have you chosen? Good job.

Now, ancient Greek city-states were all equal size, that's what statement A says.

I don't think that's correct, because we've just seen a map, and the map showed us that there were very large states and some very small states.

So, that can't be true.

Statement B, a polis and a city-state are the same thing.

Polis is an ancient Greek word, and that was the ancient Greek word for city-state.

So they're two different languages, but they both mean the same thing.

So option B is the correct statement, and that means that option C and D are also incorrect statements.

I'm not going to explain why though, because I want you to do something else with the statements.

I'm going to show you the statements again, and this time I want you to correct the incorrect statements.

You don't need to do anything to statement B because we know that that one is already correct.

Pause the video now while you make your corrections.

And remember, if you want to, you can work with a learning partner for extra support.

Have you finished? Good job.

Let's look at the answers together.

This is how I corrected statement A.

I said that ancient Greek city-states were many different sizes.

B, we know is already correct.

This is how I corrected statement C.

I said that Corinth is an example of an ancient Greek city.

It is a city, not a colony.

Colonies were areas of land, where ancient Greeks settled, that were in other countries away from the mainland of ancient Greece.

The colonies were still ruled by the city-states, but they were not part of the city-state itself.

Statement D, I corrected so it said, ancient Greece had temples and agoras, because an agora and a temple are not the same place.

A temple is where people went to worship their gods, and an agora was a marketplace.

Great job, well done.

Let's continue and find out more about what we know about ancient Greece.

The map shows ancient Greece.

All of the city-states of ancient Greece were part of the same civilization.

So this means that they shared a common language and culture.

So even though the people were divided into those separate city-states, the civilization of ancient Greece was the same throughout them all.

The way of life that people had was very similar from one city to another, because of that shared culture.

People from different city-states could easily communicate with each other because they spoke the same language, ancient Greek.

People from different city-states had the same religious beliefs.

They all worshipped the same gods and goddesses, and there were temples dedicated to them all over ancient Greece.

The statues in the photograph show Zeus and Hera, they were the king and queen of the gods in ancient Greek mythology.

The way that people organised themselves in city-states was also similar.

So, for example, it was common to find enslaved people in almost every household of ancient Greek.

Enslaved people were people that were owned by ancient Greek families.

And enslaved people were seen as the least important people in society in ancient Greece.

Sam also recalls that enslaved people included men, women, and children.

In ancient Greek society, men were seen as the most important citizens.

The men were allowed to join the councils, the men were allowed to vote, and they were the people that made the decisions.

Women didn't have those same rights, and they were seen as less important than the men in ancient Greece.

Some of the Oak Academy children are talking about what they know about ancient Greece.

Aisha says, "Men had a lot of power in ancient Greece." Jacob says that "Traders from different city-states could communicate with each other." And Andeep says, "People could worship the gods at temples, no matter where they lived in ancient Greece." All of those statements are true, well done.

Now, we are historians though, so if we are going to make statements, then we also need to provide some extra information or evidence to explain how we know what we are talking about.

So now I would like you to talk to a partner, and think about what evidence we know about ancient Greece that could support those statements.

How do we know that those statements are true? Pause the video now while you talk to a partner about the evidence that you could suggest.

Finished? You've got some great ideas.

The Oak Academy children are going to share their ideas about evidence with us now.

Aisha says her evidence is that men were seen as the most important in Greek society, and that explains how we know that men had a lot of power.

Well done, Aisha.

Jacob says that his evidence is that all ancient Greeks spoke the same language, which is why traders from different city-states were able to communicate with each other.

Well done, Jacob.

That's true.

Now, Andeep's evidence is that all city-states had temples where the ancient Greeks worshipped the same gods and goddesses.

Great, that is also very true.

That explains why no matter where anybody lived in ancient Greece, they could still worship their gods at temples.

Time for an activity now, and you are going to need all those facts that you know about ancient Greece.

You are going to use your knowledge to solve a crossword puzzle.

I'm going to share some clues with you.

One word is the solution to each clue, and you fill in the words on the puzzle.

If there are any clues that you're not sure of, move on and complete the clues you are more certain of first, because the letters in those words can help you to find the answers that you're not sure about.

Okay, let's have a look at the clues.

First of all, clues for the words going across.

Each clue is numbered, and that number corresponds to where the word is in the puzzle.

So the first is clue number two, and it's the word for a place where men went to exercise.

Clue five, people went to temples to do this.

Seven, a person owned by another person.

Eight, a building dedicated to a god or goddess.

Nine, an ancient Greek marketplace.

So they are all the words that go across in the puzzle.

Now, the words that go down in the puzzle.

One is the ancient Greek word for a city-state.

Three is the area built at the highest point in a city.

Number four, a group of men that would vote to make decisions in ancient Greece.

And number six, a place where people watched plays.

You can pause the video now while you complete the puzzle, then we will look at the answers together.

All done? Did you find all of those words? Excellent.

Here's what your puzzle should have looked like.

You can see that the words going across are gymnasium, worship, enslaved, temple, and agora.

And the words going down are polis, acropolis, council, and theatre.

I hope you had fun completing that puzzle.

Now, we're going to move along to the second part of our lesson today.

We've looked at what we know about ancient Greece.

Now, we're going to think about how we know what we know, okay? So this lesson, as you know, is a history lesson.

And when we are in history lessons, we are being historians.

Historians are people who investigate the past, and they examine evidence to try to better understand what people and places of the past were like.

All of the information that we know about the past has come from the work of historians, and they have shared their work through books, or the internet, or television programmes, or other media.

So everything that we know about ancient Greece, for example, was investigated first by historians.

Jun and Alex are talking about the job of historians.

Jun says that "Historians help us understand how ancient people lived," and that's right.

Alex says that "Historians share their knowledge so that we can know more about the past." That's also true.

Well done, Alex.

Now, I would like you to write a sentence of your own to explain how historians have helped us to learn about ancient Greece.

Pause the video now while you write your sentence.

All done? Good job.

I've got an example here to share with you.

I've written that historians investigate ancient Greece, and share their knowledge with us, so that we can understand how ancient Greeks lived.

Was your sentence similar? Good work.

Now, by investigating evidence, historians then try to make conclusions about people, places, or events from the past.

Those conclusions that are reached by historians are called generalisations.

Do you remember generalisations was one of our keywords from earlier? Generalisations are wide reaching statements about a time, place, or group of people, like the ancient Greeks.

So, the things you know about ancient Greece are generalisations.

When a historian writes down their generalisations, that's called giving an account.

That was our second keyword, wasn't it? An account is one version of events that may have happened in the past.

Historians have often done so much research, and discovered so much information and evidence that they cannot always write everything they know about a place, people, or an event in their account.

And this is right, Laura.

This is very true.

Historians do not always agree with each other either.

Sometimes details of the past cause disagreements between historians, but generalisations are things that most historians do agree are probably true.

So thinking about the job of historians now, I'm going to read you a sentence, and I would like you to decide if it is true or if it is false.

Listen carefully, historians' accounts of the past are always completely true.

Is that sentence true or false? Have a think now and make your choice.

Have you chosen? Good.

I chose false.

Did you? Now, do you remember earlier, we heard some statements that the Oak Academy children were making about what they know about ancient Greece? And then we talked about how they needed to provide evidence or explanation to prove how they knew what they were talking about.

So, in this situation, we also need something to back up how we know that that statement is false.

I'm going to read two possible statements now, and I would like you to decide which one is most helpful in this situation.

Statement A says that historians' accounts of the past are a version of events, and historians do not always agree with each other.

Statement B says that historians do not know everything about the past, they have to investigate and make generalisations.

Which of those two sentences is most helpful to explain how we know that it is false to say that historians' accounts are always completely true? Have you picked? Good.

Now, I picked statement A here.

Statement A explains what an account is, that an account is a version of events, and that historians do not always agree with each other.

So therefore we can't say that one historian's version of events is completely true, if another historian has a slightly different version of events in their account.

Statement B is true, but that explains what historians do, it doesn't explain what accounts are.

Good job.

Now, it's time for an activity.

You are going to need some writing paper and pencils for this.

It's your turn to be a historian.

You are now going to write your own account of what life was like in ancient Greece.

Here's some tips for you before you start.

You should use evidence to support your account, okay? So if you make a statement, remember, you need to explain it, or provide some extra evidence or information.

You should try to use keywords.

Try to write about similarities and differences in ancient Greece.

You can spend some time planning, or note-making first, and then write up a final version of your account.

Your final account should be written neatly, and you should proofread your own work.

You might type up your final account on a computer.

Pause the video now, whilst you plan and write your account.

Have you finished? Good job.

Now, Jacob from Oak Academy is going to share his account with us.

Jacob says that ancient Greece was a civilization from over 3,000 years ago.

It was made of lots of areas called city-states, polises in ancient Greek, that all spoke the same language, shared the same culture, and told the same myths.

That's a great start.

Jacob is using lots of keywords and providing evidence.

Then he says, ancient Greeks also had the same religion and worshipped gods and goddesses, such as Hera and Zeus, at temples.

Ancient Greek cities also had similar buildings, such as gymnasiums, theatres, and an agora.

Very good, so Jacob is now moving on, and he has talked about the similarities of different places in ancient Greece.

He goes on to say that across ancient Greece, society was organised in the same way.

The men were seen as the most important, and were part of councils which made important decisions and held votes.

The women were seen as less important.

And the enslaved people, which were owned by many households, were seen as the least important.

There were some differences between the city-states of ancient Greece, and they did not always get on.

For example, Sparta and Athens were rivals, and they fought each other for 25 years during the Peloponnesian War.

City-states had different landscapes, different weather, and their people were good at different things.

What an excellent account Jacob has written.

He followed the writing tips very well.

Great work, Jacob.

So this concludes our lesson about what we know about ancient Greece.

Let's have a quick review of what we have covered.

We know that ancient Greece was a varied collection of different city-states and people that had many differences between them.

But there were many similarities in their culture.

For example, they had common myths, gods and goddesses, and the existence of enslaved people throughout ancient Greece.

We know that historians try to make generalisations about the places and people they investigate, and they cannot always include everything they know about a place or people in their accounts.

Historians have made generalisations and written accounts about what life was like in ancient Greece, and that's what we can use to help us learn about the ancient Greek civilization.

I really enjoyed being a historian today, and making generalisations about ancient Greece in my account, I hope you did too.

And I'll see you again for another history lesson, goodbye for now.