You are a party of four professionals: a reporter, a historian, a cartographer, and a photographer. Your mission in whatever job capacity you choose is to answer the following questions:

1.   Did the gods and goddesses rule Ancient Greece?

2.   What were their influences on the people in their daily 
       lives?

3.   What influences do the ideas of the Ancient Greeks have
       on our lives today?

• You will be assigned to a group of four students.
• You will choose your job description through any method of your group's choosing. For example: volunteering, flipping a coin, drawing straws, etc.
• You will search out your job description and use associated Internet links to solve the questions and collect information to contribute to your group's tasks.
• You will help organize information in a group folder.
• You will remember to stop and save your work along the way and share your newfound information with your partners, so they can add it to their folders.
• You will keep all URLs and a description of each in a separate reference file marked "References".
• You will print out individual logs and group references to turn in to your teacher.
• You will use a checklist to verify that all questions have been completed.
• Your group will prepare a formal presentation to be shared with the rest of the class.

The Reporter's job will be to relay facts, events, and interpretations to the general public about the journeys of Odysseus.

The Reporter's project will be to:
 

• Create newspaper headlines and for each chapter of The Odyssey.
• Present the Greek alphabet showing similarities to the Roman alphabet that we use with English.
• Use Pictures from the photographer to go with the headlines.
• Assist the photographer in finding information regarding ancient Greek art, architecture, the environment, and people.
• The Reporter will answer these QUESTIONS
• Useful Links for the Reporter
• Greek Alphabet
• The Odyssey Homepage
• World Geography TEKS:
• 6B: Explain the processes that have caused cities to grow such as locations along transportation routes that has attracted settlers and economic activities and continuous access to other cities and resources.
• 2A: Describe the human and physical characteristics of the same place at different periods of history.
• 1B Trace spatial diffusion of a phenomenon and describe its effects on regions of contact such as the spread of the bubonic plague, the diffusion and exchange of foods between the New and Old Worlds or the diffusion on American slang.
• 5A Analyze how the character of a place is related to its political, economic, social, and cultural characteristics.
• English I TEKS:
• 9: The student will read world literature to increase knowledge of his/her own culture, the culture of others, and the common elements across cultures. 
• 9A: To recognize distinctive and shared characteristics of culture through reading.
• 13: The student reads in order to research self-selected and assigned topics.
• 13A: To generate researchable questions.
• 19B: To locate appropriate print and non-print information using texts and technical resources, periodicals, and book indices, including databases and the Internet.
• 19E: To draw conclusions from information gathered.
• World History TEKS:
• 22B: Culture--beginning of civilization in Ancient Greece.
• 14A: Culture Events and effects that lead to information of ideas.
• 1A: Meajor eras
• 2B: Present to past. 

An historian is someone who chronicles the lifestyle of a particular place during a particular time.

The historian's job will be to create a link (compare and contrast) between Homer's Greece to today's society.

The historian's project will be to:
 

• Examine people, places, and environments at local and regional areas of the Mediterranean as traveled by Odysseus.
• A major portion of the project will center on the physical processes that shaped and shapes the lives of the peoples living in this area.
• The historian will answer these QUESTIONS.
• Useful Links for the Historian
• Exploring Ancient World Cultures

English I TEKS

4a,, 4b, 4c, 4f--Writing/inquiry/research
9a, 9b--Culture

World Geography TEKS
8a, 8b Interrelationships among physical and human processes.
 
 

The Cartographer's job will be to utilize maps to demonstrate the development of various aspects of greek culture from the time of Homer to present day Greece.

The Cartographer's project will be to utilize maps to:
 

• Compare locations mentioned in Homer's The Odyssey to present day locationes in Greece.
• Show the influence of each god or goddess to each point of Odysseus's journey.
• Show trade relationships between Greece and other ancient empires.
• Use a combination of maps and visual images to compare the physical environment of Homer's Greece to that of contemporary Greece.

The Cartographer will answer these QUESTIONS
 
 

English I TEKS:

8D: Interpret the possible influences of the historical content on a literary work.
9A: Recognize distinctive and shared characteristics of cultures through reading.

World Geography TEKS:

1A: Analyze the effects of physical and human geographic patterns and processes on the present.
2A Describe the human and physical characteristics of the same place at different periods of history.
 

The reporter's job will be to collect and annotate photos that depict Greek life and culture in both Ancient and modern times.

The reporter's project will be to:
 

• Assist the reporter in finding images to match news headlines.
• Build a multimedia photo album, slide show, travel brochure, or story board that includes captioned photos depicting ancient and modern Greece. 
• The photographer should consider art, architecture, the environment, and people.
• The reporter will answer these QUESTIONS.
• Useful Links for the Photographer
• Mr. Dowling's Electronic Passport
• Perseus Digital Library
• Google Image Search
• English I TEKS:
• 19A:  Describe how meanings are communicated through elements of design, including shape, line, color, and texture.
• 19B: Analyze relationships, ideas, and cultures as represented in various media.
• World Geography TEKS:
• 16A: Describe distinctive cultural patterns and landscapes associated with different places in Texas, the United States, and other regions of the world, and how these patterns influenced the processes of innovation and diffusion.
• 16B: Give examples of ways various groups of people view cultures, places, and regions differently.