Students will investigate what archaeologists do and what they're digging up lately.
What You Need
- Access to the Internet or reference books
What to Do
- Ask students to do research online or in reference books to find out more about the basics of archaeology and what archaeologists do. Have each group find answers to various questions about the field. For example, How do archaeologists find sites to study? How do they do their excavations? How do they handle the artifacts they find? Have students take notes on their findings and then share them in a class discussion.
- Then ask each group to research a current or recent archaeological dig. What are scientists hoping to unearth? What is the history of the site they are studying?
- Have each group share its research with the class.
Internet Resources
This page contains links to nine archaelogy Web sites.
http://emuseum.mankato.msus.edu/archaeology/archaeology/links.html
This site, an official publication of the Archaeological Institute of America contains numerous articles about archaeology.
http://www.archaeology.org