Sumer and the First Cities

Begin with the map so students can place the rivers and cities, then read about Sumer. Have students discuss the six laws in pairs before writing their answers, and check written responses against the sample answers in the key.

Read about the first cities of Sumer, rank its social classes and explain ziggurats. The directions on the page read: Read the text about Sumer. Then answer the questions on page 2. An answer key is included.

Yes, both. We made it for 6th Grade Ancient History, and the page works the same whether it lands on a kitchen table or a center rotation. At home, most families go through it together and talk the answers out loud, and that talking is where most of the learning happens with Mesopotamia. In class it runs well as independent work while you pull a small group. Print one copy or thirty, whichever the day needs.

Mesopotamia means land between the rivers. It lay between the Tigris River in the east and the Euphrates River in the west, and students label both on the map in The Fertile Crescent.

It is one of the oldest sets of laws to survive, carved on a tall stone slab about 1754 BCE. The worksheet gives six laws in modern words so students can see how punishments often depended on the class of the person who was hurt.

Inventions of Mesopotamia pairs the wheel, plow, sailboat, cuneiform, irrigation canals, bronze, the ziggurat and the 60-minute hour with what each one did. Sumerians developed cuneiform about 3200 BCE, first to keep records of grain and animals.