Subject: Social Studies
Lesson Length: 55 - 60 mins
Topic: Human-Environment Interaction
Brief Description: Students will explore the interaction inhabitants of river valley civilizations had with their surrounding environments and how they adapted and innovated to meet their needs.
Know Before You Start: Students should be familiar with the location of the early river valley civilizations (China, Indus Valley, Mesopotamia, and Egypt).
Hook:
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Ask students to brainstorm all the ways we use water today. Prompt with questions such as “who uses water?”, “why is it important?”, “what is made with water?”.
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Read and discuss the sample comic, focusing on the development of early civilizations near water sources.
Activity:
- Introduce the following vocabulary:
- irrigation
- terrace farming
- environment
- adapt
- domesticate
- innovate
- modify
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Have students choose one of the four river valley civilizations (Indus Valley, Ancient China, Mesopotamia, Ancient Egypt).
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Using the sample comic as a guide, have students create a three-panel comic illustrating in what ways water was important to the civilization and how the inhabitants interacted with the water in their environment.
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Describe the innovation that came from this interaction, e.g., terrace farming, irrigation.
Closure:
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Discuss the different innovations that resulted from early civilizations interacting with their environments to meet their needs.
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Discuss how civilizations still use these innovations today.
Differentiation:
- Allow students to use the speech-to-text feature.
- Allow students to use the voiceover feature to read their comics aloud.
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Give students a fact sheet with information about each civilization.
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This activity can be done in groups, pairs, or independently.
Starter Pack
Ancient China
Ancient Egypt
