Ancient China with older students

China is a fascinating country full of many ideas and technology. Many great inventions, which we still use today, originated in Ancient China.  The landforms in China served as barriers and isolated the country from the world around it for many years. Travel and communication, within as well with neighboring countries, was difficult. 

Students, grades 4^th through 8^th,  learned how China’s geographical features have impacted China. To start the unit off, the students were introduced to China through its inventions. The students were assigned four inventions and were asked to determine where and when the invention was made. When they convened later they found out that these inventions were mostly invented in China. Only two inventions they discovered were invented in India and Europe. Later the class discovered both these inventions were in fact originally invented in China, but because of China’s geographical isolation other countries, such as Europe and India, received credit for the invention. This fact led us to develop a timeline comparing the dates when inventions were made China and in the Western World. We then asked the question, "Could the time difference in the date of inventions have been caused by the geographic barriers in China?"

China’s barriers of mountains, plateaus, deserts, rivers and seas made it difficult for even the Chinese within China. One activity demonstrated to the class how difficult it was to communicate and travel within China. Each student took on the role of one of these barrier and had a visual of what China’s barriers looked like. This led to a map activity in which the students had to identify the major barriers by color as well as answer questions based on the labeled map.

To end our unit the students were given articles about two major rivers: the Yellow River and the Yangtze River. While reading these articles, the students realized that these rivers were unlike the other barriers because they benefited China. The rivers provided rich soil, a source of food, a way of travel, cooking, as well as cleaning.