Lesson video

Hello, I'm Mr. Hutchinson, and welcome to our lesson on history.

And we're learning all about prehistoric Britain.

Can't wait to get started with today's lesson where we're going to be investigating some of the similarities and differences between the different Stone Age periods.

Now, we've talked to this bit about this in the past in terms of how one of the really important historical skills.

So we need to learn a lot about history.

But one of the things that historians do is they look at history and they look at what changed and what stayed the same.

What are the differences and what are the similarities as time goes on? And we're going to do that today.

I'm going to talk about that today with respect to the Stone Age periods.

So our lesson's going to look like this.

We're going to just recap the different eras of the Stone Age.

Then we'll look at some of the similarities between the Stone Ages and also some of the differences between the Stone Ages.

We're just going to look at some, because there are lots and lots and lots.

And I hope that, by the end of this lesson, it will give you a bit of a different way of thinking about history.

That whenever we're learning something in this unit, you will think, hm, is this a similarity? Or is this a difference? Have things got different or have things stayed the same? It's a good way to think about everything that you're learning.

So, first of all, let's just recap our different eras.

You should be really good at this by now.

We've looked at them in each of our lessons.

What were the three eras within the Stone Age? There was that old Stone Age, the middle Stone Age, and the new Stone Age.

Pause the video and write out the names of the different Stone Ages now.

Great work.

Let's check to see if you are right.

So the old Stone Age was the Palaeolithic Stone Age.

Make sure you spelled it correctly, especially that E sound spelled ae.

The middle Stone Age was the Mesolithic era and the new Stone Age was the Neolithic era.

Well done if you've got those right.

You can give them a tick.

If you got them wrong, then just pause the video and edit them now to make sure that you've got the correct names in your book or on your piece of paper.

So let's just remind ourself the timeline, the chronology, the timeline that we're looking at here.

So we can go right back to a hundred million years ago.

We can zoom into the last hundred million years.

And one of the big events from the last hundred million years was the dinosaurs going extinct 65 million years ago.

And after that, we got the age of the mammals.

But for millions and millions and millions of years, we didn't appear.

After the dinosaurs went extinct, there were millions of years that went by and the first humans only appeared quite recently, about two and a half million years ago.

Let's zoom into that little period here.

Just this 10 million year chunk here.

And we'll see that.

So this is now 10 million years ago.

We'll see that the first humans appear just two and a half million years ago.

And Homo sapiens, our species of human, we're quite a recent species.

There were different species that we saw evolved and developed over time and split off from each other.

And our species, Homo sapiens, was only about 300,000 years ago.

And the Stone Age, when early humans were using stone tools, was through through this whole period of two and a half million years ago, until quite recently.

We were in a Stone Age until we discovered metal.

And we're going to learn about that in a future lesson.

So let's zoom into these 3 million years here which include the Stone Age and the first humans.

So the first era that we talked about was the Palaeolithic era, the old Stone Age.

And there were some things that only happened in the Palaeolithic era.

There was also the Mesolithic era, and I put the circle of the Mesolithic era over the top of the Palaeolithic era here.

Now we know that those two periods were separate.

So with the Palaeolithic era ended and the Mesolithic era started about the time that the world started to warm.

About the end of the Ice Age.

But I put them into the top of each of each other here because there were some things that humans did that were the same in both eras.

So there are some things that humans only did in the Mesolithic era.

And there were some things that humans only did in the Palaeolithic era.

And there were some things that they did in both.

What about the Neolithic era? Well, there were some things that humans only did in the Neolithic era.

We're going to talk about those.

So when the Neolithic era started at the end of the Mesolithic era, humans started doing different things.

But there were also some things that were the same throughout the whole of the Stone Age.

All three eras.

And where they cross over here, the three different circles, that's where we're going to put anything that stayed the same for the whole of the three eras.

There's also some things that only happened in the Mesolithic and Neolithic era.

So they would go in this little place here.

So this is called a Venn diagram, and it helps us to categorise different things that happened.

Some things that happened that stayed the same, that happened in multiple eras and some things that were different and only happened in certain eras.

Did you know that people were playing musical instruments even 40,000 years ago? So these were found 42,000 years ago.

Or there they were found recently, but they're from 42,000 years ago.

So we know that we have musical instruments in the Palaeolithic era.

Because 42,000 years ago is the Palaeolithic era.

But we still use musical instruments in the Mesolithic era and in the Neolithic era.

So musical instruments is something that there was a change in the Palaeolithic era where humans first started to use musical instruments.

And then that stayed the same in terms of humans still using musical instruments throughout the different ages.

Here's another thing, another artefact from the Palaeolithic era.

This is called a hammer stone.

So these stones would have been stones that the early humans found and they were just the right size to fit in our hands and they used them to hammer things.

So these were called a hammer stone.

And we've found hammer stones from all sorts of different eras.

It's a really useful tool.

It's not one that had to be made.

You can just find them.

And but what humans did is they used that object as a tool in a way that most other animals don't.

Most other animals don't use things in their environment to help them.

Some do, but most don't.

Now, the hammer stone was such a useful tool that even though we found them from the Palaeolithic era, we've also found them in the Mesolithic era and the Neolithic era.

This is some amazing cave art.

And this cave art is actually from a place called Chauvet and it's about 30,000 years old.

You can see here the different animals, the rhinoceroses that have been painted.

And art is another example of something.

That we have examples of art from 40,000 years ago, 30,000 years ago, during the Mesolithic era, about 10,000 years ago.

And during the Neolithic era, including on the buildings that they had.

So humans, it looks like, were drawing for all of the different eras.

So here's a little task for you.

This is one of the things, drawing, art.

This is one of the things that stayed similar throughout the Stone Age.

Have a look at this.

And why don't you have a go at sketching some cave art just like this cave painting from Chauvet? I'm sure that you've got a really fantastic cave painting.

And I wonder why prehistoric people drew those cave paintings.

Maybe they wanted to let other people know that there were rhinoceroses in the area.

Maybe it was a sort of like instruction manual of how to hunt rhinoceroses.

Or maybe it's just that humans enjoy expressing themselves through art and always have done.

And still do that today.

Really interesting in terms of what's changing and what's staying the same.

There's evidence that humans have eaten bread for at least 40,000 years.

So bread is something that we still eat today.

It's something that was eaten widely in the Neolithic era, but we know that the Palaeolithic era, 40,000 years ago, there's evidence that humans were even eating bread then.

So where would bread go? If we were putting it in our Venn diagram, we would have to put bread in the middle here because we ate bread in the Palaeolithic era.

So it's in the Palaeolithic circle.

In the Mesolithic era.

So it's in the Mesolithic circle.

And the Neolithic era.

So it's in the Neolithic era.

So it's in all three because it's something that's stayed the same.

Us eating bread is something that stayed the same.

We always ate bread.

So let's see if you can have a think about some of the changes and similarities.

Here's a statement.

As time went on through the Stone Ages, humans didn't use any of the same tools.

Is that true or is that false? Choose your answer now.

Let's see if you were right.

So that's false.

Humans developed new tools.

So that is something that changed, that humans developed new tools, got better and better at making more complex tools.

But they also kept some of the same tools and used the same tools like a hammer stone, for example.

So now that we've looked at some of the similarities between the Stone Ages, let's look at some of the differences.

Some of the things that did change.

We've looked at some of the things that stayed the same throughout the different eras.

Now let's look at some of the differences.

Well, one of the big differences was pottery.

And we have lots of examples of pottery from the Neolithic period.

This pottery is from Iraq.

And it's from about 4,500 BCE, before the common era.

And so that is.

That's about six and a half thousand years old.

That's from the Neolithic period.

And it's beautiful pottery where humans were really perfecting this art and this craft to create this pottery.

But it was during the Mesolithic era that humans first started to make pots.

So we're starting to see a difference here in that in the Palaeolithic era, we don't have any evidence that humans were making pots in the Palaeolithic era.

Probably because they were moving around all of the time.

And so pottery is not a good thing to use to sort of like travel around with because it can get easily broken.

It's one of the reasons that we don't have much evidence from it, because it gets easily broken in the ground and destroyed.

And so we can't find it.

If we do find it, we tend to find little shards of it, little broken bits.

So why were Mesolithic humans and Neolithic humans.

There's a change here.

Why did they start to make pots and then perfect pots and make more and more pots? Pause the video and write down your answer for why you think, what you think these pots might have been for.

Great.

So I wonder what you said.

You might've said that these pots would have been useful for storing things.

Maybe some oil or some grain or some water.

Pots might've been useful to store things in.

Now, if you're moving around, you don't need to store anything because you're not staying in the same place.

But as, in the Mesolithic era and Neolithic era, when people started to stay put for longer periods, then there's a need to store things because you're staying in the same place.

You're building up lots of.

I don't know what you're building up lots of.

Maybe some grain that you're sort of harvesting.

So you need somewhere to keep it.

You might want to go and collect some water from the river and it's always the same river.

So the river's just nearby and you want to collect plenty of water for the whole day.

And so you might use a pot to collect the water.

So, because things were changing in the way humans behaved in the Mesolithic era and Neolithic era, they were staying in the same place.

They also wanted to, they also started to change the sorts of things that they made.

So where would pottery go if we look at our Venn diagram? Was it just in the Palaeolithic era? Was pottery made in both the Palaeolithic and the Mesolithic era? Was it made in all three? Where we're getting this middle bit here, all three.

Was it the Mesolithic era and the Neolithic era? Or was it just the Neolithic era? Put your finger on where you were put the pottery.

Which section of this Venn diagram? Well done if your finger is just there.

So the pottery was from the Mesolithic era and the Neolithic era.

So well done if you chose that place in the Venn diagram.

Another thing that changed was language development.

So one thing that changed between the different periods was our language started to get better.

So in the Palaeolithic era, the language was probably just grunts and cries.

Can you do some Palaeolithic grunting? Maybe you see an animal nearby that's dangerous.

And so you want to say to the other people in your group.

It would've initially just being those grunts and cries to show different emotions.

That would have been Palaeolithic language.

It's quite fun to do.

Maybe you can make up your own Palaeolithic language in the Mesolithic era, language would have started to become more complex.

So in the Mesolithic era, humans were starting to stay in the same place for longer periods.

And so, because they're staying in the same place, they're able to talk to each other more.

In the Palaeolithic era, early humans, they didn't have the sort of vocal chords that Homo sapiens have.

And also, because they were always moving around, they wouldn't really have time to stop and chat.

They'd be quite spread out and just looking for that hunting stuff.

In the Mesolithic era, they're starting to get better and better speech because they're spending more time closer together.

And in the Neolithic era, there'd been lots more words and different sorts of languages and dialects appearing because people are staying in the same place and they've got much more, they've got many more things around that they're making and creating.

They've got different things near to them.

And so in the Neolithic era, language would have started to become a lot more complex.

Speaking in full sentences, using more and more words.

So let's see if we can put all of those ideas together.

I've got some sentences here that I'd like you to complete.

And along the bottom in black, I've just got the words that will go into these gaps.

So early human language was just and.

Later language became more and sounds gained.

Better language would have helped groups and work.

It would also have been crucial for.

And your words are hunting, grunts, complex, together, cries, meaning, and bond.

So pause the video and write out that full paragraph, filling in the gaps.

Great work.

Let's see if you are right.

You can give yourself a tick if you were and you can correct it if you've got it wrong.

No problems. So early human language was just grunts and cries.

Well done if you've got those right.

Later, language became more complex and sounds gained meaning.

Better language would've helped groups bond.

Stick together and work together.

And it would also have been crucial for hunting.

If you can speak in complex language then you can say, okay, there's a woolly mammoth.

You need to go around the top of the cliff.

I'll stay down here and scare it.

As it runs up towards you then you can all throw your spears at it.

Then it will turn around and the rest of you can have your bow and arrows to attack it as it, as it runs away from the spears.

If you're able to use language, then you can make a really good plan like that.

That's where language development became so important.

So as you said, during the Neolithic period.

That's when humans started to settle down into much more permanent homes.

They started to build up homes made of mud.

So different sorts of like mud and clay to make the walls.

Or maybe even brick and stone, if that was nearby.

And they'd stick in the same places and they'd start farming.

And this was a huge change.

Farming is, the Neolithic era, we call it the new Stone Age because that's when humans started farming.

They grew crops.

So they actually grew their own crops.

They cultivated plants, which means they weren't just finding crops already around.

They were getting the seeds and planting them so that they could then harvest them.

And they also domesticated animals.

If you domesticate an animal, it means that you.

It's the opposite of it being wild.

You make that animal so that it doesn't mind having humans around.

And it's easy to sort of move from one place to another and stick where it is.

The earliest animals would have been goats and sheep and cattle, which is cows.

So human started to domesticate those animals and keep them nearby on their farms. And they also built those permanent homes and stopped moving.

So let's see if you can.

Let's see if you can put all of those ideas together and talk about the similarities and differences across the Stone Age.

So, now you thought about lots of things that stayed the same throughout the Stone Age and lots of things that changed between the different periods.

Let's put all those things together.

I've given you some sentence starters.

Across the Stone Age, many things stayed the same for humans.

For example, you can give some of your examples.

On the other hand, there were some big changes in how people lived, for example.

So you need to choose some of the ideas that we've talked about today and write out a full paragraph with those ideas.

And you can pause the video and start that now.

Awesome.

I'm going to give you an example that I wrote and you can compare yours to mine.

So I wrote, across the Stone Age many things stayed the same for humans.

For example, many of the tools that they used remain similar.

On the other hand, there were some big changes in how people lived.

For example, language and art developed across the eras.

Especially during the Neolithic era.

Humans stopped moving around so much and they settled down in more permanent homes to farm the land.

So they're just some of the ideas that I put down.

We actually learned about a lot more.

But one of the most important things is that throughout human history and prehistory, some things stayed the same and other things were different.

Some things stayed similar and some things changed.

You've done an awesome job today with our lesson and I've been really, really impressed with you.

In our next few lessons, we'll be learning a lot more about humans settling down and staying in the same place and farming.

And there's this sort of huge change that we've talked about.

This revolutionary change.

We're going to be learning more about that.

I can't wait to see you in those lessons.

Well done for today.

Well done for your hard work.

Well done for writing down all of your answers and thinking hard about prehistoric Britain.

You're already learning so much and you're going to learn a lot more.

I'll see you next time.