6th Grade Geography and Ancient Civilizations Classes Explore Cave Art

According to the geological record, the earliest fossilized record of bacteria, a sign of life from the Precambrian era, is 3.5 billion years old. Spiders started showing up much later, just 400 million years ago. Lucy, the oldest upright, bipedal who seemed more human than ape, lived just 50 million years ago.

But hey, we’ve got the woolly mammoth beat! They were late to the show, arriving a mere two million years ago – barely yesterday in geological time.

Using Larry Gonick’s Cartoon History of the Universe and a variety of supplemental sources on archaeological method, cave art, early religion, and the roots of language, the 6^th grade has been exploring how humans came to be so complex in so little time – geologically speaking.

You can admire original 6th grade cave art (pastels on crumpled paper!) in the hallway. This display features hands – one of the most common motifs in Cro-Magnon’s Ice Age artistry. These hands – traced, stenciled, and drawn throughout caves 10 to 20 thousand years ago – appeared across the globe, from the Americas to Europe, Africa, and the South Pacific. What did these ancestors of ours intend? Worship? Ritual? Signature? The hunt? Control? Graffiti?

Cave art seems to be a combination of narrative (story), ritual, and symbolic language. These markings tried to say something in an organized fashion, perhaps to give a challenging Ice Age existence meaning and hope.

What language will our students leave for the future? Part of our mission at Explorer West is to give students the tools to envision and work towards a lasting future. The past is a rich place to start.