Guess the Greek Olympians!

Answer Key

Here is an interactive blog post about the Olympians of Greek Mythology. The gods of Mt. Olympus have gathered. Can you figure out who they are? Use what we have learned so far to figure out each character based on their appearance. Post a comment with your answers/guesses. Be sure to number your responses. Good Luck! 
Optional blog post. However, posting a comment might result in an advantage in the City-State Olympics. 
(Hint: We have never talked about #13. Clue: He has something to do with fear, panic, shepherds, and flocks.) 

City-State Project Helper

The Greek City-State project is underway. We are busy working, creating, designing, thinking, learning. I want to provide you with some items that will help you with this project, especially the Olympic Games. The Academic part of the Olympics will feature topics such as: vocab, mythology, city-states, myths, real people, and Ancient Quest. Below, I will provide you with links to help you get ready for that. The Athletic portion of the Olympics will feature five games, also linked below. Practice and prepare, for the City-State Olympics are only 3 days away! (Project Requirements HERE)

Real People of Greece ---- Democracy ---- Myths ---- Mythology ---- Vocab Words ---- Athletic Events

Pericles, the great leader of Athens, with a message

Greece City-State Olympics!

Our Greece City-State week has arrived, finally. You will be placed in a city-state. You, along with the other citizens of that city-state will be preparing for the Olympics at the end of the week. The Olympics have two parts: Academic and Athletic. In order for your city-state to get into the Olympics, you must present your city-state project to the class. This blog post is designed to provide you with some reminders on what to do. You must work together. You did not get to select your group members so you and your fellow citizens need to figure out how to get along and get all work done. The Olympics is the end of this project, but before we can get to that part, we have a lot of work to do. Each city-state must accomplish the following: Flag, Visitor's guide, and city-state website. If all requirements are done and presented, you and your fellow citizens will be allowed entry into the most prestigious athletic and academic event in the history of the world (or at least in my class).  Use your class time and work hard!

Click Here for the City-State Project Requirements

Zeus has a Message for you

Zeus has stopped by to give you a message. You better listen to the message and do what he says because you do not want to get on his bad side...

White Shirt Production: "What is Democracy?"

What is Democracy? Well, that question is the focus of my trip to the Sioux Falls Empire Mall as I try to figure out whether or not people know what Democracy is. In this video, you will see me and my assistant (Mr. Ellingworth, my student teacher 2 years ago) interview random people at the Sioux Falls mall and ask them about democracy. What do you think will happen? Will they know the answers? Will they be clueless? Will they even talk to me? Will they get mad at me? Check out the video to see what random people at the mall have to say about Democracy. Don't forget to check out the deleted scenes at the end!

Ancient Quest: Chapter 7: I Climb Mt. Olympus

Johnny's break from his ancient quest is over. No more help with the vocab words, no more help with the Greek Mythology characters. It is time to resume this harrowing adventure and see if he is tough enough, strong enough, and smart enough to accomplish his task in ancient Greece. As the title says, Johnny will be climbing Mt. Olympus, the mystical, mythical mountain of Greek Mythology. What will he encounter? What obstacles and dangers are waiting? Will he survive this place filled with power and magic? So many questions to be answered. It is time to begin....
Read: "I Climb Mt. Olympus"

An Interview with a Mythology Character

This week you will be interviewing the Greek Mythology character you chose. This interview will be made up by you. The interview will be between you and your Greek mythology character. One question you might have is, "What is the interview about?" Well, think of it as more of a conversation between you and whoever you are. Ask them questions, have dialogue, talk about their symbol, job, story, etc. This task is going to help us with our writing skills, thinking skills, and creativity. So, have fun and be creative! Try to come up with a humorous/interesting interview. Pretend your 'audience' knows nothing about your character and this is your chance to teach them. There should be information in your interview about your character, so at the end, the reader will have learned something. 

Task: Create and write an interview between you and your greek mythology character. 
Details: In your interview, you should talk about your characters symbol, job, and at least 1 other thing about them. 
DUE DATE: February 19th, 2013. Midnight. 
Points: 20

Example:
Me: "Hi! What's your name?"
Artemis: "Hello sir. My name is Artemis."
Me: "Wow! That's a cool name. My name is Dan."
Artemis: "Wow, that's a plain name."
Me: "That's not very nice. Plus, it has three versions: Dan, Danny, and Daniel. So there."
Artemis: "Whatever."
Me: "Why do you have that silver bow?"
Artemis: "Well, I am the goddess of the hunt and moon. So I take my special bow with me at all times."
Me: "It kinda looks like the silver bow Katniss Everdeen uses in the Hunger Games."
Artemis: "Katniss who?"
Me: "Katniss Everdeen. From Hunger Games. She's way cooler than you."
(Artemis draws back arrow with bow right at me)
Me: "Hey now!!! Wait!!! What are you doing???"
(Artemis pulls back arrow further...)
Me: "Okay, okay!! Stop!! You are cooler than Katniss! Way cooler!!"
Artemis: "That's what I thought, you weak mortal."
Me: "So, do you have any siblings?"
Artemis: "Yes, I actually have a twin. His name is Apollo."
Me: "Oh, that's cool. Good for you. Well, I gotta go. Bye."
Artemis: "Ok. Whatever. Bye."
(As I'm running away): Me: "Katniss is actually cooler!!!!!"
(Artemis zings an arrow at me and barely misses)

Johnny Takes a break from his Quest (Greece Vocab)

Johnny Rawten has been busy. So far, he's completed 5 tasks in his Ancient Quest. He has helped save/improve the lives of many, many people in the Stone Age, Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, and India. All this traveling and adventure has made Johnny very tired. So, he's decided to take a break from his Quest to help us learn about the ancient Greece vocabulary words. It sure is nice of Johnny to spend his rest time helping us improve our ancient Greece knowledge. Click the link below to discover the meanings of your Greece vocab words. However, Johnny will only be able to rest for a short time because soon he will be off to ancient Greece to try to accomplish his sixth task. Hurry up and get these words defined, we don't know how long Johnny will be here!

Read: "Johnny Takes a Break from his Quest" 
(Greece Vocab help)

Ancient Greece Cornucopia

Ancient Greece is a unique civilization. No major river and no desert make this unit far different than the previous units. Ancient Greece also has Greek Mythology, which makes it highly interesting. Before we dive into Greek Mythology, we are going to experience the Greece Cornucopia. If you have seen the Hunger Games, you know that a cornucopia is a big horn-type structure that has many different things inside. So, for our Greece cornucopia, there will be many different topics to discuss. To do the discussion today, we are going to use one of my favorite tech tools: "todaysmeet" which allows us to "chat" with each other instantly. We will be able to help each other, share with each other, and teach each other. Since we have just started Greece, we might not know too much about it, so, we are going to have to use some website to help us with information. Use the websites on the right side of the blog to help you find information. 
Period 3---Period 4---Period 6---Period 8---Period 9

Welcome to Ancient Greece

Ancient Greece has arrived. And with it, many fascinating things, especially Greek Mythology. Thanks to movies and books, Greek Mythology has become quite popular (Percy Jackson, Rick Riordan). We will definitely be covering Greek Mythology but we will also take a look at the city-states of ancient Greece, government such as Democracy, and the Olympics. Greek Mythology will, however, be our focus much of the time in this unit. We will learn about the gods/goddess, the Titans, the monster children like Medusa and Pegasus. We will read about hero's and myths. It is all fascinating stuff that I think you will enjoy learning about. The ancient Greece unit will feature some new ideas and activities from the past units we've studied. Buckle up, hold on, and watch out for Zeus's thunderbolt: ancient Greece here we come!

A little encouragement from Kid President

Check out this video from Kid President. He's got a little encouragement for you. I thought this would be a good video for you to watch since you have a test tomorrow. Good Luck!

Who do you want to win the Super Bowl?

On Sunday, the San Fransisco 49ers and Baltimore Ravens face off in the NFL's Super Bowl. The winner of this game will not only get a huge money bonus, but also be able to call themselves the champions of the world in football. This game is unique because the head coaches of the 49ers and Ravens are brothers, John and Jim Harbaugh. Also, interesting to point out is that Jim's oldest son Jay is an assistant coach for the Ravens. The Super Bowl is a wildly popular and entertaining event, one of the most watched sporting events of the year. The commercials that are shown during the Super Bowl cost each company over 1 million dollars. Today in class, we had an awesome surprise as the two quarterbacks of the Super Bowl, 49ers Colin Kaepernick and Ravens Joe Flacco, stopped by for a visit to talk about ancient India. It was very nice of them to stop by despite how busy they are with the Super Bowl only 2 days away. They almost got in a fight, though, so I had to keep them apart. 
The only question now is, who do you want to win? 

Updated "Showcase"

One of the many purposes of this blog is to share student work. So, as we close out our ancient India unit, I thought we would take a look at the showcase and see the new items I've added. Great work everyone!

Scroll through the pictures to the LEFT to see the most recent pictures.