Blog Challenge: Unscramble the word, win a book!

Unscramble this word and win your own copy of Johnny Rawten. Be the first to post the correct answer and you are the winner! Good Luck!

"All Roads Lead to Rome" (Blog Book Roads)

Roads? Aren't roads kinda boring? Don't they just sit there on top of the earth and do nothing but provide a path for people to travel? Yes, that's basically what a road does. However, in Rome, that seemingly simple task was extremely important. Because of the vastness of the Roman Empire, roads were extremely important because the military, emperor, and others needed to be able to travel throughout the empire easily. With roads, the entire Roman empire was connected. The Romans built a lot of roads. Not only did they build a lot, but they also built GOOD roads. They revolutionized the way roads were built, taking it from a dirt path, to an actual road built with stones, mortar and blocks. Whenever the Romans would conquer another town or city, they would build a road back to Rome. So the phrase, "all roads lead to Rome" was actually true during this time period. The picture you see is an image of the Appian Way, the most famous Roman road ever made. As you can see, the Appian Way, like most of the Roman roads, were built in a straight line. They were also built with gutters and roads signs showing how far it was to Rome. The gutters and road signs gave the Roman roads a modern day look. 

In your Blog Book, you will complete two tasks for the "Roads" section.

1. *Click Here to see the different layers of the Roman Road. Use the picture to label the layers of the Road in your blog book.

2. Somewhere else on the Roads page, answer the following questions with COMPLETE SENTENCES:

     1. What is the most famous Roman Road?

     2. Why were roads so important to ancient Rome?

     3. How did the Romans revolutionize (change) roads? 
     4. What gave the ancient Roman roads a modern look? 

Roman Numeral Battle Monday: Time to Get Ready

Here we are, once again, with some Roman Numeral practice. This isn't just any old practice, this is very important practice. How important? Well, Monday, there will be a Roman Numeral Battle for points in the Social Studies League. It is your responsibility to do your part and make sure you know how to translate. Over the weekend, please practice these Roman numerals so you can help your team in the battle. For this practice post, I have included an answer key and a link that explains roman numeral translation. So, go through the practice questions, then check the answer key to see if you got them right. If you got them wrong, look through the translation website and figure out what you did wrong. Be prepared. Be confident. Your team needs you on Monday. Good Luck.

Roman Numeral Translation: Find the translation of each number. Post a comment or simply write them down on paper and check the answer key.

1. 56

2. 32

3. 98

4. 411

5. 609

6. LXXIV

7. CXII

8. CCCLXII

9. DCCXXXIX

10. MCCCIX

Answer Key

Website for translation help

The Pompeii Disaster

The Pompeii disaster rocked the Roman empire. The eruption of Mt. Vesuvius completely wiped out the city of Pompeii, burying it in ash and pumice. Though a completely devestating event, it allowed scientists to learn a great deal about the time period. Pompeii essentially became a time capsule, as the ash froze everything in time. As it was excavated, the archiologists couldn't believe what they found. Gaps were found in the ash and as the scientists poured plaster into these "holes," they discovered that it was where people died during the eruption. They were all frozen in time, in the position they were in when they died. Mt. Vesuvius is a "stratovolcano" which erupts every 2,000 years. It's last eruption was 79 AD, so it might be due for another....
Below, you will find a story about the last day of Pompeii, written by a 12 year old kid that witnessed the devestation as he and his family fought to stay alive.

Post a comment on what you think about Pompeii and the destruction Mt. Vesuvius caused....

Read: Pompeii Final Day

Make your own Volcano erupt

Rome Blog Book #4: "Daily Life"

Time to focus on Daily Life. In class, you will explore the Roman's daily life of entertainment, education, and housing. For your blog book, your Roman daily life focus will be on clothing. Using the attached website, read about the clothing of the ancient Romans. The article will talk about clothing style for men, women, and young people. The article will also discuss hair styles, jewelry, etc. For your activity, you will compare the clothing style of the ancient Roman's to the clothing style in 2012. You will point out similarities and differneces with a Venn Diagram. On the "Roman" side, simply list things about Roman's clothing style that is different than ours in 2012. In the "Clothing in 2012" side, list things about our clohting style that is different than the Romans. In the middle, under "similarities," list things that we have in common. You can compare your clothing style to theirs or just clothing style in 2012 in general.

Read about the clothing style of the ancient Romans.

Quantity: For each section of the Venn Diagram, you MUST list at least 3 things.

***Important: If you put "wore Toga's" for the ancient Rome side, you can NOT put "do not wear Toga's" for the clothing in 2012 side.

Ancient Blog Book Begins!

Get ready for the never before used "Ancient Rome Blog Book." As we launch this new product on WSG, prepare yourself for some intense learning via the blog. With this blog book, you will use Water for Sixth Grade to fill it out. The blog book does not require you to post comments, but to use the posts or whatever is loaded on to the blog to complete the activity. In your blog book, you will be covering many different topics. Each topic will be labeled. We will insert the topics as we go throughout the unit. You will be expected to get this blog book completed essentially outside of social studies, though from time to time, we will have "blog book catch-up days" in which we will be in the lab and you will have a chance to get caught up. If you ever miss blog book posts on WSG, simply look in the label cloud for "blog book" and you will find all the posts that are tied to your blog book. Finally, this is going to be a very valuable resource as we go through the Rome Unit, so be sure to do a good job, which I know you will.

Good Luck and as always, thanks for being such rockin' students.

Roman Numeral Practice

Okay, my little Roman Numeral experts. Here is some practice for you. Can you translate Roman numerals? Here are some numbers for you to translate. Remember, we see Roman Numerals a lot in our world, so it is good to learn how to read them. Plus, there will be translation on the test. So, good luck!
Roman Numeral Practice:
1. 45
2. 89
3. 678
4. 921
5. 301
6. 331
7. 570
8. 811
9. CXXIII
10. CDLXIX
11. CCI
12. CLXXVIII
13. DCXXVI

Ancient Rome: "You Are There"

All year you have been reading about other people time warping back into ancient civilizations. Now, it is time for you to time warp. Johnny Rawten gets to time warp. The I Series character gets to time warp. Why can't you?
We have introduced ourselves to ancient worlds a number of different ways (library books, video, comic books, textbook, etc.) I think, though, that the best way to get introduced to an ancient world is to not read about it. Not watch a video about it. But to actually GO there. With this new creation from WSG, you will time warp back to ancient Rome. You will spend a day in this ancient civilization discovering and learning about it. You will be making decisions. Your decisions will have consequences and like all decisions, some are better than others. So now, it is time for you to time warp. Hang on, its going to be a wild ride. (Maximum score is 100. Good Luck!)

Play: Ancient Rome-You Are There

Bonus Questions: As you made your way around Rome, making decsions and dealing with the consequences, you discovered many things about ancient Rome. Can you find the answers to these bonus questions in the game? Post a comment with your answers.

#1: What type of food do patricians eat?

#2. What is a Eques gladiator?

#3. Where do charioteers race their chariots?

#4. What is the Forum?

#5. What is the Pantheon used for?

Thank you!

BLOG CHALLENGE: ROMAN NUMERALS

Blog Challenge: This is a number written with Roman Numerals. Can you figure out what number it is? Be the first one to post a comment with the correct answer and win an authentic Augustana Football Helmet. Good Luck!
Use this website to help you decode Roman Numerals: Roman Numerals Help

Ancient Quest: An action adventure through the ancient world

Ancient Quest takes the reader on a wild ride through the ancient world. The main character, Johnny Rawten, goes back in time on a quest to help the people of the ancient world and save a Tiger he killed in the Roman Colleseum. Join him, as he attempts to accomplish major tasks in the Stone Age, Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, India, Greece, Rome, and the Medieval Times. Check out this website for a lot more:

Accept the Quest (http://acceptthequest.blogspot.com)