Delian League PowerPoint and Trial Exam Structure

Hi Guys!

It's been ages, I know. I suppose because all of the stuff went up last year, I haven't needed to update so much...

The Trial HSC will be held in Week 5. The format will be as follows:

5 minutes reading time
3 hrs writing time
4 sections (45 mins per section)
100 marks (25 marks per section)

Section 1: Pompeii. Multiple choice and short answer, using sources (15 marks). One extended response on conservation & reconstruction of the past (10 marks).

Section 2: Sparta. 4 or 5 questions, ranging from a 2-marker to a 10 or 12 marker. Focus on all aspects of Spartan society, government, and economy.

Section 3: Xerxes. One 10 mark question (describe/outline type) and one 15 mark question (explain/assess type). Could be on any aspect of his career or legacy.

Section 4: Greek World. One 25 mark question. You will be given two choices, one focusing on the Persian Wars, one on the Delian League era.

You should aim to write approx. one page per 10 marks.
Make sure you use the sources EXPLICITLY. That is, say things like, 'Source A shows that...' or 'As Source B tells us...'
The best exam prep you can do is to write practice responses. Access previous exams on the BOS web page.

Feel free to email me at thomas.griffith@det.nsw.edu.au so I can give you feedback on your writing.

The PP we did on the Delian League is below. You can download it directly here.

The Delian League

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Lycurgus - Man or Myth?

Hi Year 12. The half-yearly is coming up very soon - Monday - so here is a list of what you should study:

Pompeii - everything in the syllabus, making sure you have plenty of detailed knowledge of large topics such as: public buildings, everyday life (religion, politics, leisure, commerce), and archaeology/conservation.

Sparta - everything in the first two syllabus areas: Sparta's geography, society and government (including areas such as the agoge, the army, women, and Lycurgus).

On that note - here is the PowerPoint we did on Lycurgus...

Lycurgus

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The Agoge

Hi Year 12. Here is the PowerPoint we did in Friday's class, on the Agoge:

The Agoge

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You can download it directly here.

Year 12 Ancient - Spartan Society

Hi Year 12...here is the PowerPoint on Spartan Society I promised to put up. Make sure you know the Kings, Ephors, Gerousia, and Apella, as well as the Spartiates, Inferiors, Periokoi and Helots. Happy revising!

Spartan Society

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Year 12 Ancient - Spartan Society

Hi folks. Just a quick link to the HSC Online site on Spartan society (i.e. the homoioi, the Inferiors, the periokoi, and the helots) and the agoge.

You can access the site here.

I will post some links for the exam in the next few days.

Class of 2010 - Welcome!

Hi guys...sorry it has taken me a while to get back onto the blog. Term 1 has been rather hectic. Anyhow, welcome to your last year of high school, and a very fun three terms of Ancient History. I will be uploading powerpoints, resources and links onto this blog, so please feel free to access it whenever you want for revision/study/extension purposes.

I wish you all the best this year, and look forward to sharing some historical knowledge with you. First up: the PowerPoint on archaeology at Pompeii...you can watch it here, or download it from this link.

Archaeology in Pompeii

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Year 12 Ancient - The Exam...

Well, it seems that the exam was quite do-able...no major surprises, apart perhaps from the tourism at Pompeii question. Hopefully you all remembered that we did the gerousia in the trial, and I'm sure that Xerxes' foreign policy was a topic you were completely fed up with. The Greek World questions were both excellent, I thought, although the use of 'to what extent...' rather than 'evaluate' may have thrown you off a little.

Anyway, hope it all went well, and all the best for the rest of your exams. It's been quite a journey...

Year 12 Ancient - The End of The Road

For all the Ancient students sitting their exams on Monday:

GOOD LUCK!

Year 12 Modern - Recent Exam Questions

Hi folks. I thought I would post the Germany and Conflict in Europe essay questions that have been in the past three years' HSC exams. The new syllabus has only been examined since 2006, so these are the best questions to give you an idea of what they will ask you.

Read them, have a go at answering them, and focus on the wording of the questions, and the dot points that they cover.

Germany:

2008: (a) Account for the successes and failures of democracy in Germany in the period 1918– 1933. OR (b) To what extent can Nazism in power be seen as totalitarianism in the period 1933– 1939?

2007: (a) Explain how and why German social and cultural life changed in the period 1923-1939. OR (b) Assess the impact of Nazism on German foreign policy in the period 1933-1939.

2006: (a) Assess the importance of nationalism as a cause of the failure of democracy in Germany in the period 1918–1934. OR (b) To what extent was Hitler responsible for the development and implementation of Nazi racist policies in Germany in the period to 1939?

Conflict in Europe (only tested since 2006)

2008: (a) Evaluate the view that the air war determined the outcome of the European War. OR (b) Assess the significance of the Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact to the outbreak of war in 1939.

2007: (a) Evaluate the view that Operation Barbarossa was the major turning point of the European war. OR (b) To what extent did Allied and Axis strategies during World War II affect civilians?

2006: (a) Evaluate the view that the dictators Hitler and Mussolini were primarily responsible for the tensions that led to the outbreak of war in Europe in 1939. OR (b) To what extent was the Soviet Union (Russia) responsible for the Allied victory in the conflict in Europe?

Year 12 Ancient/Modern - Revision Advice

Hi Ancients and Moderns. The end is very nearly nigh, as we cruise into the home straight before the HSC next month.

We have started our revision in class (the whole syllabus has been tackled - hurray!) but you should now be formulating your home study plans.

Everyone has a different way of learning, but I will give you some very general tips.

1) First, print off a copy of the four relevant syllabus pages for your class topics. You can access them via the link to each syllabus to the left of this post.

Ancient: Pompeii, Sparta, Greek World 500-44BC, Xerxes
Modern: WW1, Germany, Conflict in Europe, Albert Speer

2) For each dot point in the syllabus, take a sheet of A4 paper, and try to write a page of notes on that point. You could do it as a mindmap, or as full sentences, or as dot points. Whatever works best.

3) If you can't scrape together a page of notes - you need to study that topic in more detail! Go back to your books and do some reading!

4) Then, have a go at some past exams. Go to this page to access past exam papers, from 2001 to 2008:

http://www.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/hsc_exams/

5) Download the papers, try writing responses in Word (set yourself the same time limit as you would have in the HSC), and email them to me. I will gladly read and comment on them.

6) Get used to all of the relevant terms used by the Board of Studies. Go to this page to make yourself familair with words like describe, outline, assess, explain, evaluate, account for:

http://www.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/syllabus_hsc/glossary_keywords.html

7) Make some judgements about what we have learned this year. As you are revising, ask yourself, 'What do I think about this?' Was Xerxes a tyrant? Was Speer a self-serving opportunist? Was Hitler a madman? Did the Great Depression cause the rise of the Nazi party? Was Sparta a democracy? Was the battle of Salamis really a turning point? Why did Germany lose WW1? Was the Treaty of Versailles too harsh? Did the Soviet Union win WW2 for the Allies? What is the most important building excavated at Pompeii? Should we display the casts of human bodies pioneered by Fiorelli?

Remember - take a stance, and support it with evidence.

8) For each topic, memorise four or five short and general quotes. Quotes always look good in an essay! Find some that you could sue in a wide range of essays. Maybe some Pliny for Pompeii, Herodotus for Xerxes/Greek World, Plutarch for Sparta...

9) If there are gaps in your knowledge - now is the time to fill them. Email me - I'm here to help!

Good luck!!

Year 12 Modern - End of WW2 PowerPoint

As promsied, here is the PowerPoint we watched on Tuesday. It summarises the last few years of the war, from Stalingrad to Berlin:

The End of World War Two

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You can download it here.

Year 12 Modern - The End of World War Two

Hi Modern folks. Welcome back after the trials, and welcome to the end of the war. We are going to polish off the Conflict in Europe topic by the end of next week, and then it's on to some good old-fashioned revision.

First: a few of the online resources we used in class yesterday, inlcuding some rather cool Nazi newsreel footage. I'll put the PowerPoint up soon as well.

You can access an animated map with an overview of WW2 here.

Here is the Youtube clip showing the rescue of Mussolini in 1943:



And here is the clip showing the Battle of Kursk:



And finally, the last film footage of Hitler, awarding medals to some alarmingly young Hitlerjugend members:

Year 12 Ancient - Persepolis

Hi guys, and welcome back after the trials. The verdict seems to be: more on Greek World, more on Xerxes, more on Sparta...which is fine, because that's what we'll be doing. You are getting better and better at Pompeii (you have been tested on it three times, now) but we will come back to that some time before the end of term.

In today's lesson, we looked at this great website from livius.org, focusing on the building and reliefs at Persepolis. it really is worth a closer look, if only to see some of the beautiful ruins that still remain after 2500 years. Click on the links and enjoy.

Year 12 Ancient - Xerxes/Persian Wars Sources

Just a quick post. I have compiled some of the most relevant chunks of Herodotus, to provide some quotes on Xerxes and the Persian Wars.

You can access them here.

All the best in Monday's exam, I'm sure you'll all do wonderfully!

Year 12 Ancient - Xerxes in The Persians

Some more quotes for you to play around with. The following are all from the play The persians, written by Aeschylus (a Greek) who actually fought at Salamis. Despite being fictional, the play is about real events, and gives us a fair idea of the Greek view of Xerxes: tyrannical, impetuous (acted before thinking), ill-fated, and hubristic (let his pride take him over the edge).

Quotes about Xerxes from the Play The Persians by Aeschylus

“The mighty Xerxes from Darius sprung”

“Deep were the groans of Xerxes when he saw This havoc; for his seat, a lofty mound Commanding the wide sea, o'erlook'd his hosts” [watching Salamis]

“Xerxes, ill-fated, led the war”

“Xerxes sent forth the unwise command, The crowded ships unpeopled all the land”

“The impetuous Xerxes, thinning all the land.” [of people, that is]

“The impetuous Xerxes learn'd; these caught his ear With thy great deeds, as winning for thy sons Vast riches with thy conquering spear, while he Tim'rous and slothful, never, save in sport, Lifted his lance, nor added to the wealth Won by his noble fathers. This reproach Oft by bad men repeated, urged his soul To attempt this war, and lead his troops to Greece.” [This is saying that Xerxes had never done anything of worth, and so he led his troops to Greece to try to secure his legacy]

“The unpeopled land laments her youth By Xerxes led to slaughter, till the realms Of death are gorged with Persians”

Year 12 Ancient - Sources on Sparta

Another bunch of ancient sources for your study purposes...this time on Sparta. I have included the full translation of Plutarch's Lycurgus just because it is so important.

Sources on Xerxes and the Persian Wars to follow...

You can access the Sparta sources here.

Year 12 Ancient - Sources on Pompeii/Herculaneum

Hi everyone. As promised, here are some ancient sources you can quote in your exam responses for Pompeii & Herculaneum. I have included some grafitti inscriptions, commerical wax tablet inscriptions, and the letter from Pliny the Younger about the eruption.

Sources on Sparta, Xerxes and the Greek World will follow soon...

You can view the document as a webpage here.

Year 12 Modern - Trial Exam Advice

Well, the Trial HSC will be this Friday. A bit of last-minute advice for all you Modern students...

For WW1, focus on perspective, reliability and usefulness of sources. Be prepared to write extended responses on the larger topics: for example, the nature of warfare on the Western Front, the reasons for the stalemate, the changing attitudes of soldiers and civilians, the effects of 'total war' on civilians, the turning points of the conflict, and the aims of the Big Three at Versailles.

For Germany, remember you will have a choice of two essays. Usually, one will focus on Weimar, the other on Nazi Germany. Be sure that you know all about the problems faced by the Weimar Republic, how the Nazis achieved power, and the nature of Nazi society from 1933-1939, as well as Nazi foreign and religious policy.

For Speer, have a working knowledge of his career (maybe memorise ten important landmarks in his life). Make a list of all of his achievements and failures. Formulate an opinion on his significance as a historical personality. Be able to argue whether he was a successful person, or an unsuccessful person, and back it with evidence. Have an opinion on the guy!

For Conflict in Europe, know the steps leading to war (LA-SCRAMCUP, dictatorships, failure of the League of Nations), and the chronology of the war from 1939 to 1943. Have a detailed knowledge of the early successes of Germany (Poland, Denmark, Norway, France, Belgium, Holland, Luxembourg, Yugoslavia, Greece) as well as the failed Barbarossa campaign up to and including the Battle of Stalingrad. Revise the Battle of Britain, the Battle of El Alamein, and the effects of the war on civilians in Britain and Germany. Make sure you know about Nazi racial policies in Europe.

Have a go at some practice exams on the BOS website. Try this link for last year's paper.

Most of all - good luck! Email me if you have any problems on thomas.griffith@det.nsw.edu.au

Year 12 Ancient/Modern - Poll Results

Sorry it's taken a while...but here are the latest poll results:

The Battle of Stalingrad got 100% of the votes for 'most interesting battle', of the three we study. Which I agree with...an incredible and tragic event in world history.

As for Athenian statesmen, 44% of you thought that Themistocles was the greatest, with Aristides close behind on 33%. The rest of you went for Pericles.

New poll up after the trials.

Year 12 Modern - Civilian Statistics

Hi Year 12. Here is a rather badly copied-and-pasted screenshot of the notes from yesterday's lesson. It gives a list of civilian-related statistics from WW2, for both Britain and Germany. You should be able to click on the image and see it in a higher resolution.