unit+2+compare+civilizations

=For this work you need to choose 2 early civilizations from Asia/Africa to compare with one from America. (3 in total) So, for example, you could compare Phoenicians, Shang and Olmecs or Egypt, Indus Valley and Maya. There are some links in Unit 3 websites that you can use.=

**Asia/Africa - choose 2**


 * Egypt**
 * Phoenicians**
 * Shang Dynasty (Huang he valley China)**
 * Indus Valley (India/Pakistan)**


 * America - choose 1 **


 * Maya**
 * Olmec**
 * Zapotec**

=Characteristics=


 * 1. Advanced cities**
 * 2. Advanced technology**
 * 3. Specialised workers**
 * 4. Writing and record- keeping**
 * 5. Complex institutions**

Advanced Cities
 * What buildings did they have? eg. palace, temple, shops, houses
 * Who lived there? eg. did everyone live in the city or only some professions?
 * What were the buildings built from? eg. mud bricks, timber, stone
 * What facilities did they have? eg. bathrooms, wells, running water, entertainment complexes
 * How were they planned or organised? eg. were they organised in wide, symmetrical blocks, were all the buildings squashed together, was there a special place for the temples or shops?

Specialised Workers
 * What sort of workers were there? Write a list of some and then describe two or three of them in more detail, showing the sort of things that they did or made. You could include how people chose or learned different professions.

Complex Institutions
 * Did they have an education system, and if so, could everyone be educated?
 * What role did priests and religion play in the organisation of the cities and the lives of the people?
 * Did they trade with other people outside the city?
 * Did they have government officials who were in charge of collecting taxes, the justice system, the distribution system etc?

Advanced Tecnology
 * Remember that this also includes things like maths and ways of organising that made life easier, such as calendars and time measurements as well as inventions such as wheels and pots.

Writing System
 * Describe what the writing looked like, who could learn/use it and what was actually written.

Conclusion

When you have looked at all the information about the three civilisations, write a paragraph or two about which one you think was the greatest. Gives examples from your research to explain why. For example:
 * Compare cities and see which was more organised, more complex or better built.
 * Whose technology was more advanced or important to us today?
 * Who had a better system of government or education?
 * Compare the sort of things they traded and who they traded with - did they travel a long way to other places, for example?
 * Did they have factories or special areas in the city where the same type of workers could be found?
 * Who had the most highly specialised workers, or the biggest number of specialisms? Do people still use their methods or similar methods in their jobs today?
 * Which type of writing was easier to use, did some of the civilisations record more information than others?

Remember that we do not always have the same amount of evidence from the civilisations. For example, we have more records of writing from Mesopotamia because the clay tablets were not destroyed like Egyptian papyrus. Do not assume that a civilisation did not do something because there is no evidence of it, but use the evidence that we do have to make your final decision. __You do not have to mention all five characteristics of civilisations in your paragraph.__ If there is not enough evidence to judge certain characteristics in some of the civilisations, you can mention this in your paragraph.

=Here is the rubric:= == = = = = =In a Powerpoint, put pictures of the five characteristics for each civilization with a short description for each characteristic in your own words.= =At the end write which civilization was the best, the one you would have preferred to live in and why you think that. The last slide should be your bibliography, divided into America and Asia/Africa, with at least 3 websites for each.=

= = =**The following Powerpoint has pictures of some Africa/Asia civilizations.**= =The following Powerpoint is a template that you can use to get the idea of what to do and to have all the slides in order with the titles. You just need to save it with a different name and put the extra slides, titles, pictures and information for your civilizations on the slides.= = = =The following document has the information from the World History book - timeline + characteristics of civilizations.=