It's all Greek to me!

We started out our day by looking over the Greek alphabet.  The word alphabet comes from the first 2 letters of the Greek alphabet.  Alpha and beta = alphabet, how clever!

We used the alphabet guide from the Evan-Moor history pocket and tried to write a few words.  They do not have all of the same sounds that we use in our alphabet so we just did the best job we could spelling the words phonetically.

This is what we came up with.

We also learned about the Greek amphora.  Here is a definition and a picture of an amphora from Wikipedia  An amphora is a type of ceramic vase with two handles and a long neck narrower than the body.  These amphorae were used to transport water, oil, and wine among other things.

Greeks were famous for their art.

In the Evan-Moor pockets, there was an assignment called An Amazing Amphora in which only half of the amphora was drawn and you had to use symmetry and draw the rest.  We also decorated them but we gave them a modern look instead of an ancient look because we like a lot of color.

Next on the lesson list was to talk and learn a little about the great poet, Homer.  No one really knows a lot about him.  Some think he was a blind bard (a professional poet) and some think he was illiterate.  Some think he traveled around singing his poems.  Some historians think he lived sometime around 850 BC and others think it was around 1194 to 1184 BC closer to the time of the supposed Trojan War.  Either way, he is known for 2 of the most famous epic poems ever written, The Iliad and the Odyssey.

This is a puzzle sheet from  Betsy Stout.

Another book that was full of information and a lot of illustrations.

Well, we are almost done with our ancient Greece study for now.  I am sure we will visit this topic again in the future.