Song dynasty · 960-1279

Song China: printing, compass and gunpowder

Under the Song dynasty, China printed books with movable type, steered ships by compass and wrote down the first recipe for gunpowder. Students explore the inventions and ask why they changed the world so slowly.

Teach it live New Open on the map
Length
50 minutes
Ages
10–13
On the map
3 steps, AD 1100 to AD 1450
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

Under the Song dynasty, China printed books with movable type, steered ships by compass and wrote down the first recipe for gunpowder. Students explore the inventions and ask why they changed the world so slowly.

By the end of the lesson, students can

  • Name three Song inventions or improvements and explain what each was used for.
  • Explain how printing helped the Song civil service exams and spread knowledge.
  • Compare Bi Sheng's movable type with the later printing press in Europe.
2

Explore the map

15 min

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

a

AD 1100

Song and its neighbours

Open the map in 1100. Find the Song Empire and its northern neighbours, the Liao and the Xixia. Why would the Song need strong new weapons on this border?

Open this view on the map
b

AD 1100

A crowded south

Zoom in on the Yangtze delta. Quick-ripening rice from Champa let farmers here grow two harvests a year. How would that help cities, trade and printing grow?

Open this view on the map
c

AD 1450

Printing in Europe

Turn on Spreads > the printing press and drag the slider from 1450 to 1500. Where does this spread begin? About how many centuries after Bi Sheng's movable type of the 1040s?

Open this view on the map
3

Class discussion

15 min

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

  1. Bi Sheng made movable type from baked clay in the 1040s. Why did most Chinese printers still prefer carved wooden blocks?
  2. The first written recipe for gunpowder appeared in a military book of 1044. Why would a government want to control such knowledge?
  3. Ship pilots used the compass at sea by the early 1100s. How does a compass change trade?
  4. Song China had about 100 million people, more than any other state on Earth. What problems come with so many people?
  5. These inventions later changed Europe too. Why do you think they spread west so slowly?
4

Game round

10 min

Rule History has no Song emperor, so play Genghis Khan, whose grandson Kublai ended the Song in 1279. Let students take turns making rulings. Then discuss: how did Song inventions such as gunpowder and ships help the Song, and how did they help its enemies?

Open Rule History
5

Worksheet

5 min

This worksheet comes with Classroom

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