The Roman army: Spy!

Spying on the Romans tn (29 KB)
The Roman army: Spy! (18 KB)
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The lesson was the third in a term's course on Invaders and Settlers for a class of 32 year 5 and 6 mixed age and gender pupils.

We had introduced the course three weeks earlier with a Mystery suitcase and continued with an investigation into Celtic Britain, where the children had written travel brochures about Celtic Britain.

This week we would visit Julius Caesar's camp before he invaded Britain in 55 BC. I wanted the children to get a clear and full picture of what the Roman army was like, before we worked on Caesar's short-lived invasions of 55 and 54 BC and the Claudian conquest of 43 AD. So we decided to move through time and space, using a magic cauldron and an invisibility cloak, to visit both Caesar's camp and a Roman battlefield. The battlefield was the one shown in the opening scenes of Gladiator.

The lesson was fully in line with the National Literacy Strategy, even down to the detail of using film as a genre.

by Jon Nichol, edited by Jacqui Dean