Sunday, April 26, 2009

Year 12 Ancient/Modern - Welcome Back!

Hi Ancient and Modern students. I hope it has been a relaxing and enjoyable Easter break for all of you. Now, back to work!

Term 2 will be a pretty tough one for all of you - there is a lot of content to cover, plus some assessment towards the end of term. Just to give you an idea, here is what we will be working on from Week 1:

MODERN: We will go straight into how Hitler turned Germany into a dictatorship in 1933-34. From there we will study some of the major policies of the Nazi Party, the nature of German society in the 1930s, and the forms of repression used by the Nazis. We will finish by examining the lead-up to World War Two.

These are the syllabus dot points we will cover:

– initial consolidation of Nazi power 1933–1934
– Hitler’s role in the Nazi state

– Nazism as totalitarianism
– the role of propaganda, terror and repression; SA and SS; opposition to Nazism
– social and cultural life in the Nazi state: role of Hitler Youth, women, religion
– Nazi racial policy; anti-Semitism: policy and practice to 1939
– nature of Nazi foreign policy: aims and strategies to September 1939
– impact of ideology on Nazi foreign policy to September 1939

This will take us into our conflict study for this year, the War in Western Europe. This overlaps with the Nazi Germany topic a bit, and covers the years 1935 until 1945. As well as the reasons for war, and the actual battles that were fought, we will be looking at the Holocaust, and the Nuremburg War Crimes trials.

This website is designed for school students, and has some excellent summaries of the major themes and concepts.


ANCIENT: We will spend the first few weeks of term finishing off Sparta - particularly focusing on everyday life, culture (art/literature/architecture), and the economy.

These are the syllabus dot points we shall cover (although some we have already looked at):

– land ownership: agriculture, kleroi, helots
– technology: weapons, armour, pottery
– economic roles of the periokoi (‘dwellers around’) and helots
– economic exchange: use of iron bars, trade
– art: sculpture, painted vases, bone and ivory carving
– architecture: Amyklaion, Menelaion, the Sanctuary of Artemis Orthia
– writing and literature: Alcman and Tyrtaeus – Greek writers’ views of Sparta
– daily life and leisure activities – food and clothing – marriage customs
– occupations

This will lead us into our Period Study - the Greek World 500-440BC. This huge topic covers the Greco-Persian Wars (you know, Marathon, Thermopylae, Salamis), as well as the lead-up to the Peloponnesian Wars, and the growth of Athenian democracy.

This website will introduce you to some of the most important people, places and themes associated with Ancient Greece during this time period.

Good luck in Term 2!

2 comments:

  1. J.K. Rowling draws many parallels to WW2 in Harry Potter. It was initially the Nuremburg War Crimes trials that reminded me of a prison in the HP series called the Nuremgard. There are also some other similarities like a wizard war in the 1940s, the obsession of a pure wizard race, and the fact that like Hitler, who was not Aryan or German himself, Voldemort was also not of pure wizard blood.

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  2. There's a lot of valid allusions to WW2, especially in Deathly Hallows. There's also the similarity of the symbol of the Deathly Hallows doubling as Grindlewald's sign.

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