Assignments to hand in: Information About Settlement Handouts (One for each location), Geography's Effect on Three Regions Graphic Organizer [Word Version] and Comprehension Questions (See below)
Essential Question: Why do people live and move where they do?
Shared Learning Target:
What will I be able to do?: You will be able to list and describe geographic characteristics of the three regions of Egypt and the Near East and explain how they affected settlement.
What idea, topic, or subject is important for you to learn and understand so that I can do this?: You will learn about how physcial geography affected the way people settled the three regions of Egypt and the Near East.
What I will do to show that you know this?: You will show what you know by completing the graphic organizer, labeling features on the three Information About Settlement Handouts, and answering the comprehension questions.
Introduction:
View the map (left) and read the Information About Environmental Factors handout. Underline the four most important geographic factors that effect human settlement. Then draw an X where you would settle on the map (left) if you wanted to start a civilization. Use the handout, How Geographic Factors Influence Settlement to help determine your location.
Ancient Egypt and the Near East Maps
Video: Mesopotamian Trade Routes and Transportation (10 minutes)
Step 1: Information About Settlement - Complete the Geography's Effect on Three Regions Graphic Organizer [Word Version]by reading each region's Information About Settlement handout and viewing the corresponding pictures below:
Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia Plains and the Euphrates River
Handout: Information About Settlement in Mesopotamia
Egypt
The Nile River in Egypt
Handout: Information About Settlement in Egypt
Video: The Nile - Where Egypt Began
Canaan
The Green Valley in Jordan / The Negev Desert
Handout: Information About Settlement in Canaan
Step 2: Comprehension Questions - Answer the following questions based on all three geographic areas (Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Canaan) on a separate piece of paper. Back up your answers with quotes and references to the texts.
1. Why did people settle at these sites?
2. What were the positive and negative aspects of these sites and how did the people overcome or deal with them?
3. How and why did these civilizations interact with one another or surrounding peoples?