New
New
Year 3

What archaeologists have found out about the Indus Valley civilisation

I can explain what archaeologists think they know about the Indus Valley civilisation and why.

New
New
Year 3

What archaeologists have found out about the Indus Valley civilisation

I can explain what archaeologists think they know about the Indus Valley civilisation and why.

Lesson details

Key learning points

  1. Archaeologists have uncovered all sorts of objects that tell us about the great cities of this farming civilisation.
  2. Archaeologists have asked lots of questions about the objects to try and work things out about these people.
  3. From these questions about the objects, they have found out lots of things about these people and their cities.
  4. However, there are still many mysteries about these people because archaeologists cannot understand their writing.
  5. A good explanation of what archaeologists think they know about this subject will use knowledge from across this unit.

Keywords

  • Archaeologists - people who dig in the ground for clues about people who lived in the past are archaeologists

  • Civilisation - a group of people who live together and follow the same ways of life and the same set of rules are a civilisation

Common misconception

Pupils may associate making guesses with being wrong.

Reassure pupils that making guesses is necessary to learn new things, and essential in jobs like archaeology. Acknowledge that the guesses are educated and based on drawing information from lots of sources to make conclusions.

Use this lesson to activate all of the knowledge already gained in this unit about the Indus Valley and let the students answer the questions on screen. For the final task the students could even try to make a model of an Indus Valley city.
Teacher tip

Licence

This content is © Oak National Academy Limited (2024), licensed on Open Government Licence version 3.0 except where otherwise stated. See Oak's terms & conditions (Collection 2).

Lesson video

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6 Questions

Q1.
A small statue or model of a person is called a ...
granary
Correct answer: figurine
mystery
Q2.
Select the possible things that figurines could have been used for.
washing
Correct answer: religion
reading
Correct answer: toys
Q3.
Historians do not know how to read the writing of the Indus Valley civilisation.
Correct answer: True
False
Q4.
What evidence tells us that the Indus Valley cities were well organised?
their religion
their palaces
Correct answer: their buildings
their writing
Q5.
Which things are still a mystery about the Indus Valley civilisation?
Correct answer: granaries
bricks
Correct answer: religion
Q6.
Put the following into the correct order.
1 - People started to farm in the Indus Valley.
2 - People got better at farming.
3 - People began to live together in groups.
4 - People built cities in the Indus Valley.

6 Questions

Q1.
Match the word to the correct definition.
Correct Answer:archaeologists,people who dig in the ground for clues about the past

people who dig in the ground for clues about the past

Correct Answer:civilisation,a group of people who live together and follow the same ways of life

a group of people who live together and follow the same ways of life

Q2.
What things do archaeologists do?
Correct answer: make guesses
Correct answer: dig in the ground
Correct answer: ask lots of questions
Q3.
When the floods, it makes the land in the Indus Valley fertile.
Correct Answer: River Indus, Indus, river indus, indus river, Indus River
Q4.
Archaeologists can guess lots about the Indus Valley civilisation from objects.
Correct answer: True
False
Q5.
What would help archaeologists understand more about the Indus Valley civilisation?
the river
Correct answer: the Indus writing
the mountains
Q6.
What do the cities in the Indus Valley tell us about the people who built them almost 5000 years ago?
They were not very clever.
Correct answer: They were clever.
Correct answer: They were good at building.
They were not good at building.
Correct answer: They were good at planning.