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Inside the Vatican:
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National Geographic Television Special |
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Airs in the U.S. on the National Geographic Channel |
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Page eleven of eleven Kindergarten through Grade 4 The Vatican is home to a unique community with its own postal service, radio station, and stores. Talk about what community means and what kinds of work or services are needed within a community. Take a shoebox, colored paper, yarn, scissors, crayons or markers, tape, glue and other art supplies and construct a shadow box community. Show the people who perform the work needed by the community and what services they perform. Reading suggestions: What is a Community? from A to Z by Bobbie Kalman; Communities by Lisa Trumbauer; Communities by Gail Saunders-Smith; Pretend You're a Community Helper by Karen Bryant-Mole; I Live in a Town by Stasia Ward Kehoe; Rome by Nicola Barber. Grades 5 through 8 The scientist Galileo was put on trial by the Vatican in 1633 for daring to support the theory that the Earth revolves around the sun, not the other way around. Discuss the role of the sun in measuring time and the seasons, and talk about why it's important to measure time, using examples from daily activities and seasonal events. To illustrate the sun's role in time measurement, take a poster board and plumbing plunger outside to a flat, sunny spot early in the day. Use a compass to place the plunger on the south side of the poster board. Tack down the poster board and draw a circle around the plunger to ensure they remain in place. Mark the top of the shadow with the time. At set intervals throughout the day (30 minutes to three hours), mark the shadow with the time. At the end of the day, connect the marks, finding the shortest section of the arc. This is local noon. Local noon is not necessarily the same as "clock" noon, which is standardized by region. The movement of the shadow on the poster board illustrates the earth's journey around the sun. Reading suggestions: Galileo by Leonard Everett Fisher; The Story of our Calendar by Ruth Brindze; The Story of Time and Clocks by Anita Ganeri; The Sun by Robin Kerrod; Morning, Noon, and Night by Jean Craighead George; Sun Calendar by Una Jacobs; The Calendar by Irving and Ruth Adler; Time by Caterina Rochat. Grades 9 through 12 Another example of the power of the papacy is in calendar history. Pope Gregory XIII, under advisement by Vatican astronomers, realized that the Julian calendar was out of step with the true seasons. A new calendar was devised that now is used by nearly every nation in the world. Imagine that you are a newspaper reporter in 1582. Pope Gregory XIII has proclaimed a new calendar that will make a one-time jump from October 4 to October 15, and henceforth will alter the designation of leap years. Write a story about the new calendar, explaining the concept of leap year and the loss of ten days on the new calendar. Consider what makes news and why, and be sure to include local angles in the story. Reading suggestions: Calendars by Necia H. Apfel; Mapping Time:The Calendar and its History by E.G. Richards; Calendar: Humanity's Epic Struggle to Determine a True and Accurate Year by David Ewing Duncan; The 365 Days by Keith Gordon Irwin; Hours, Days, and Years illustrated by Carol J. Stott; Empires of Time: Calendars, Clocks, and Cultures by Anthony F. Aveni. Inside the Vatican: Front Page St. Peter's Basilica The Swiss Guards The Pope's Day A City-State The World's Most Beautiful Stuff The Holy See Electing a New Pope The Secret Archives The Making of Inside the Vatican Kids Activity Guide |
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