Subject: Social Studies
Lesson Length: 60 - 65 mins
Topic: Indigenous Civilizations of the Americas
Brief Description: Students will explore the impact of one of the four major indigenous civilizations from the Americas: Olmecs, Incas, Aztecs, or Mayas.
Know Before You Start: Students should have an understanding that many civilizations were present in the Americas prior to European colonization.
Hook:
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Present the four major ancient tribes that populated the Americas (Olmecs, Mayas, Incas, and Aztecs.) Ask students what they know about any of these civilizations.
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Read and discuss the sample comic about the Olmec. Center the discussion around present-day ideas or technology that stem from ideas and inventions from any of these civilization, e.g., concept of zero. Discuss their impact with the class.
Activity:
- Introduce the following vocabulary:
- indigenous
- tribe
- Mesoamerica
- ancient
- society
- civilization
- agriculture
- trade
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Research the contributions of one of these ancient civilizations.
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Using the sample comic as a guide, have students create a three-panel comic illustrating the contributions of one of one of these civilizations, e.g., math, technology, literature, etc.
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Panel 1: Introduce your selected civilization. Who were they? Where were they located?
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Panel 2: What lasting idea or technology did they invent that made an impact on future civilizations? Describe it.
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Panel 3: Show how we still use this idea or technology today.
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Closure:
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Categorize and display the completed comics by civilization.
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As a class, compare and contrast the four groups.
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Have students explain which group they believe had the biggest impact and why. Students must present evidence for their rationale.
Differentiation:
- Allow students to use the speech-to-text feature.
- Allow students to work in pairs or groups as needed.
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Assign students a specific indigenous civilization.
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Provide sentence frames as needed.
Native American Heritage
The Birchbark House
Reconciliation
Ancient Aztecs
