Good morning Year 5!
The whole school topic for the remainder of the summer term is: Great Britain.
It is amazing, if not surprising, to discover just how much of today’s Britain have their origins in Ancient Greek society. The arts, sports, medicine, law, language, science, mathematics, philosophy, buildings and even some inventions, have all been greatly influenced by the Ancient Greeks.
Please look at this: BBC Bitesize: What did the Greeks do for us?
BBC Bitesize: How did the ancient Greeks change the world?
Have a look at this ancient timeline:
Not only did classical Greek culture, especially philosophy, have a powerful influence on ancient Rome but it also influenced Great Britain.
The Ancient Greeks may have lived over 2000 years ago, but they left a lasting legacy that still affects Western culture and way of life.
Interesting Facts About the Legacy of Ancient Greece and its influence on Great Britain
- Greek was spoken throughout eastern Europe for hundreds of years. Today, many European languages have words that come from Greek.
- Greek letters are still commonly used in math, science, and engineering equations.
- The Ancient Greeks were the first to use a ‘true’ alphabet, that is, one representing both vowels and consonants. The word “alphabet” itself comes from the first two letters of the Greek alphabet.
- The New Testament of the Bible was originally written in Greek.
Which one of these facts surprises you the most?
Here is an example of one I see when I go for my evening walks:
Great Britain
Today’s task: Choose one of the above and find out more about it! Share what you have found in the comments below. You may wish to present this on paper – if so, take a picture and send it via the Homework Uploader.
Your options are:
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Great British theatre
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Sports in Great Britain (e.g.: the history of football in England)
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UK Government and democracy
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The architecture of the United Kingdom, or British architecture
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Art in Great Britain
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Science, technology and maths in Great Britain (these could be discoveries made by British people)
Just like I showed you how the Ancient Greeks influenced certain ways of life in Great Britain, you can find out other influences (i.e.: Roman) and how they impacted Great Britain. It does not need to be about the Ancient Greek influences. Please ensure this is written in your own words.
I can’t wait to see your responses! Please read other comments and do reply to your peers.
Mrs Avdiu & Ms Robertson
Printer-friendly version: History blog
Hello everyone I hope you are all ok and are having a nice day this is what I found out:
Science, Technology, Maths:
The ancient Greeks made many contributions and inventions in the study of technology maths and science. The Greeks made many things some of them are the first ever alarm clocks, odometers and even medicine. Greek engineers also made great discoveries some tools that the Greek engineers invented are still used today an example the water screw. Did you know this invention was actually invented by a famous Greek scientist by the time. The Greeks were very good at science and maths and if it weren’t for them we wouldn’t have lots of useful stuff today. One inventor invented mechanical toys like birds puppets and even coin open machines. Apparently some of the ancient Greeks spent there whole life studying mathematics that must of been hard. One of these people was Euclid he was focused on geometry and wanted to understand it all. A true fact most of our geometry in maths today came from Euclid’s work. The ancient Greeks scientist were impressively clever because they didn’t just study numbers but they studied all parts and facts in science. Although at that time the biggest threats were diseases which nearly all scientist were forced to study. The greatest Greek doctor was Hippocrates. He wanted to find out what caused the disease so that he could understand how it worked and how to cure it. Although that’s one reason Hippocrates is known, he is also famous for his view on doctors and how they should act.
Hi Claudia! Thank you for sharing your learning. This is brilliant! Did anything surprise you?
Well yes I never new that the Greeks made medicine.
Ancient Greeks had lots of different styles of architecture and built many temples and houses. However, only three are well-known and are used to create buildings in modern Britain. These are the Ionic, Corinthian and Doric styles.
The Ionic style is often used in columns. These have scroll-shaped attachments on the capital, which is located at the top of the column shaft. Ionic columns are slender and more elaborate than the Doric ones ( I will talk about these later on…). Ionic columns are easily recognised because of distinctive spiral loop designs called “volutes”. They have other features such as bases of assembled discs, shafts that are usually ridged , egg-and-dart designs between volutes …
Corinthian columns are fluted and very thin. This style was aimed to be elegant and slender, a bit like the Ionic style. Its main features are the unrolled acanthus leaves on its extremely decorative capital accompanied with designs of scrolls. It was the last style to be developed out of the three.
The Doric style is the stoutest style. With simple and tapered shafts ( meaning that the base is wider than the top ), their purpose is to hold ceilings. A flat slab supporting the architrave, called an abacus,the capital to an entablature(a frieze).
I hope you will enjoy the rest of the day!
Brilliant findings. Thank you! Did anything surprise you?
Hi everyone
I hope you are having a great day so far!??
UK Government and Democracy
The United Kingdom is a democracy. A democracy is a country where the people choose their own government. In the U.K. there are too many people and too many decisions to make, therefore representatives are elected to make decisions. Representatives include Members of Parliament or for short MPs, Members of the Scottish Parliament also known as MSPs and local councillors as well. The U.K. parliament meets in Westminster, London. The Houses of Parliament has two main rooms – The House of Commons and The House of Lords, plus the monarchy. The House of Commons is made up of exactly 650 MPs and the House of Lords has around 810 Lords.
I hope you all have a great day!??
Sebastiao ⚡️⚡️⚡️
Thank you Seb for sharing your findings!
Hi everyone I hope you’re all ok.
The worlds oldest football clubs were founded in England from 1789 to the 1871-1872 season. The FA cup was founded as the worlds biggest organised competition. The first international match took place on November 1872 when England travelled to Glasgow to take on Scotland.
The quality of Scottish players such that Northern English clubs began offering the professional terms to move South.
At first the FA was strongly opposed to professional and that gave rise to a bitter dispute from 1880 until the FA relented and formally legitimised professionalism in 1885. Shortage of competitive matches led to the formation of the football league by twelve professional clubs in 1888 and the domestic game has since then been based on the foundation of league and cup football.
~Iggy
Hi Iggy! How did I know you were going to pick this category? ? Thank you for sharing your findings with us. Even I learnt a lot!
I was going pick philosophy but it was too hard to find facts about UK philosophy so I chose UK history of football.
Hi Iggy – it is not necessarily UK Philosophy but more so how the Greek Philosophers influenced Britain 🙂 Nonetheless your work on the history of football was a great choice.
Hello everyone I found this activity very fun I hope everyone has a great day ???
That’s brilliant! I hope you have a lovely day too. Can’t wait to see your work 🙂
can I please have the homework uploader
Hi Mathilde, please save this link so you have it when you need it: https://www.stvincentsprimary.org.uk/news/sharing-photos-and-files/
Hi Mathilde, thanks for sending your work in titled ‘Greek Philosophers’ but remember this task is about Great Britain and the focus needs to be on how it influenced Britain today rather than a list of their achievements. Thank you 🙂
Hi everyone.
I have decided that I am going to do the History of Sport in Britain.
Sports have gone back from 3,000 years old , back then they began throwing spears, stakes and rocks and that has influenced to the sports now. The first Olympics was in 776 BC. They did foot chariot races, wrestling, jumping, discus and javelin.
Cricket:
Cricket is from South East England in the 16th century. In the 18th century Cricket became national and in the 19th century to the 20th century Cricket became global. The bats have a willow blade, cane handle that are layered with rubber strips and tied down with twine these were made in 1853.
Football:
Over 240 million people play football all around the world. Football has been for at least 2000 years, it all started when when Asian people started kicking a ball around. Now football is a very popular sport and many people love to play all around the world, it’s now in national competitions as well.
Ice skating:
In the 14th century Holland started ice skating. The first ice skates were made out of leather from animals and the blade was a sharp object.
Wow! Some really fascinating facts. I never knew that the first ice skates were made out of leather from animals. Eek!