Neolithic · About 9000-2500 BC

Many cradles: farming begins around the world

Farming was not invented once. Rice in China, maize in Mexico, potatoes in the Andes, taro in New Guinea: students find the world's farming cradles on the map and discover where the food on their own plate first came from.

Teach it live New Open on the map
Length
45 minutes
Ages
11–14
On the map
3 steps, 5000 BC
Live lesson
7 rounds, 3 on the map
Worksheet
Two A4 pages, with Classroom
You need
A projector; phones for live

Live lesson · new in Classroom

Teach it live. The class answers on their phones.

Put the board on the projector. Students join with a six-digit code, no account needed, and tap the map: where was the frontier, where did the grain come from. Their pins drop in together when you reveal, and the closest student takes the round.

€19 per month: every lesson live, every worksheet, cancel anytime. Rome at its height runs live for free.

A live lesson on the projector: the class's pins on the map around Alexandria, the closest students listed beside it A student's phone: the question and a map to tap
7 rounds
3 places to find on the map, quiz questions, a class vote and a one-line answer.
About 15 minutes
Run it as the map step, or to open the discussion. You move on with the space bar.
A report
Every answer, per student and per round, to read back or print after the lesson.
1

Introduction

5 min

Read aloud

Farming was not invented once. Rice in China, maize in Mexico, potatoes in the Andes, taro in New Guinea: students find the world's farming cradles on the map and discover where the food on their own plate first came from.

By the end of the lesson, students can

  • Locate at least four regions where farming began on its own.
  • Match early crops to the regions where they were first farmed.
  • Explain what domestication means, using maize as the example.
2

Explore the map

12 min

Project the map, or let students follow on their own devices. Each step opens the map at the right year and place.

a

5000 BC

Two rivers of China

Open the map in 5000 BC and find the Yellow River in the north of China and the Yangtze in the south. Millet was farmed along one and rice along the other. Which crop suits a warm, wet river valley?

Open this view on the map
b

5000 BC

Maize from a wild grass

Travel to the Balsas River valley in southern Mexico. Here people began turning a wild grass, teosinte, into maize about 9,000 years ago. Zoom out: where could maize spread from here?

Open this view on the map
c

5000 BC

Gardens in the highlands

Fly to the highlands of New Guinea. At Kuk Swamp people dug drainage ditches and grew bananas and taro at least 7,000 years ago. Why might farming begin in so many places at different times?

Open this view on the map
3

Class discussion

14 min

Pick two or three. They run from what happened to why it mattered.

  1. Farming began on its own in several regions far apart. Why do you think people in different places made the same change?
  2. Each region farmed different plants: wheat, rice, maize, potatoes, taro. Why did people farm what grew wild nearby?
  3. The first maize cobs were only a few centimeters long. How could farmers make them bigger over thousands of years?
  4. Herders once painted cattle on rocks in the middle of the Sahara. What does that tell us about climate change?
  5. Which crop from this lesson do you eat most often? Where was it first farmed?
4

Game round

9 min

Play one round of Rule History as Moctezuma II, whose Aztec capital was fed by maize grown in lake gardens. Discuss: how did a wild grass tamed thousands of years earlier make a city of his size possible?

Open Rule History
5

Worksheet

5 min

This worksheet comes with Classroom

€19 per month unlocks every worksheet, every live lesson and the class workspace. The free lesson prints without a subscription.