Archaeology skills log

These activities take pupils through five steps to becoming an archaeologist:

• Finding out information
• Identifying things
• Recording objects
• Analysing how people lived
• Telling others about Star Carr

Learning outcomes

These activities support the teaching of historical skills, literacy, numeracy and art.

Each activity also has fact checks and debating points about the period.

Finding out information

Pupils do research to answer two questions:

• What do we know about the Mesolithic?
• Which of these sites belong to the Mesolithic?

Identifying objects

Three activities to teach pupils how to identify stone tools, animal bones and trees of the Mesolithic. These are supported by separate worksheets:

• Flint tools
• Flints
• Flint cards
• Animal bones
• Red deer
• Deer bones
• Trees and leaves
• Leaves, teacher copy
• Leaves, pupil copy

Recording objects

Pupils will draw, measure and describe an object from a photograph of a real Mesolithic find.

Analyse how people lived

Five activities to help pupils use evidence to understand how Mesolithic people lived and how different their life was to the present day. There are separate worksheets for each activity:

• Plants and people
• Plants, teacher copy
• Plants, pupil copy with names
• Plants, pupil copy with names
• Plants, pupil copy blank
• Plant from Star Carr
• House and home
• House plans
• House reconstructions
• The Star Carr antler headdress
• Headdress, teacher copy
• Headdress, pupil copy
• Being in the Mesolithic
• Image of a hunting camp

Telling others about Star Carr

Two activities to encourage pupils to express what they have learnt about the Mesolithic in words and pictures.

The skills log can be downloaded here.