1. Prehistory: Early Ancestors Image Sort Place these early hominids in chronological order A. Homo sapiens D. Australopithacus E. Homo erectusC. NeanderthalB. Homo habilis

2. Early Ancestors Image Sort Answers: A. Homo sapiens D. Australopithacus E. Homo erectus C. Neanderthal B. Homo habilis

3. Early Hominids Scientists and anthropologists discovered numerous remains and artifacts of hominids –H–Hominid: humans and their fossil ancestors Number of different hominids lived over several million years Australopithecines: 7 million years ago Lucy (1974, Ethiopia) Lucy (1974, Ethiopia) 3.5 feet tall

4. Early Hominids Homo habilis: “handy man” 2 million years ago First hominids to make tools Cutting, scraping, chopping, and sawing plants, animals, wood

5. Early Hominids Homo erectus “upright man” 2 million years ago Skeletons show that they were fully upright walkers Larger brains and bones, smaller teeth Pioneered a different kind of tool – ax to dig, shatter stone/bone, bore holes into hard surfaces Found in Asia/Europe

6. Early Hominids Scientists think that between 250,000 and 100,000 years ago, Home erectus disappeared and a new group emerged Homo sapiens: First lived in Africa and then migrated into other areas of the world  Two groups: Neanderthals and earliest modern humans Neanderthals disappeared about 50,000 years ago

7. Darwin, Evolution, and Natural Selection Review – Threshold 5: Life Let’s talk about human evolution!

8. Video: Humans Evolution – Crash Course https://school.bighistoryproject.com/pages/console/?clientkey=54602#lesson/{B8D467A5-4898-4BC3-81CB-4B795920ADBC}

9. Threshold 6: Collective Learning

10. Collective Learning: Snap Judgement An example of collective learning can be seen when a lioness teaches her cubs to hunt. – False: The lioness is still like a stand-alone computer — she has only as much memory as she can accumulate in her lifetime. Humans are more like networked computers, with a (more or less) infinite capacity for memory to expand The ability to use language has not played an important role in the development of collective learning. – False: Chimp language does not allow chimps to share enough information with each other. try telling a friend how to play football without talking, writing, or drawing Humans are the only species with the ability to learn collectively. – True: Because of how we can communicate and share knowledge, we can tap into a vast information network assembled by millions of humans, living and dead. No one person knows it all. Human knowledge is distributed among individuals, shared when necessary, and passed on and added to by each generation Collective learning has not empowered humans. – False

11. Collective learning should not be defined as the sixth threshold of increasing complexity. – False: Over perhaps 200,000 years, humans have built and stored a vast body of technologies, rituals, stories, and traditions that provide more and more powerful ways of dealing with our surroundings and with each other. That’s why I believe collective learning is the key to understanding human history! Collective Learning: Snap Judgement

12. Video: Humans and Collective Learning https://school.bighistoryproject.com/pages/console/?clientkey=54602#lesson/{B8D467A5-4898-4BC3-81CB-4B795920ADBC}

13. Collective Learning What is collective learning? (Read) Look at the technology around you: your phone, your computer, your car. Think about how complicated it was to create these technologies. Now ask yourself: If, during your lifetime, you could never speak to another human being, how much of that technology could you dream up? How much of it could you actually build? No matter how smart and creative you might be, the answer is probably simple: “Not much!” The same is true of other aspects of human societies: religions, legal systems, literature, and sciences. Each of us is pretty smart, but all that makes up human culture is not the product of individual geniuses. Instead, all the many different things that express the astonishing creativity of our species were slowly built up over time as millions of individuals shared their ideas over many generations.

14. Video: Early Collective Learning https://school.bighistoryproject.com/pages/console/?clientkey=54614#lesson/{F69C4E99-4A78-4F93-BA80-66C322E60DA4}

15. How do we know what we know? Anthropology – The study of how, when, and why humans and different cultures develop and live. – Anthropologists find missing links to the human story by studying different cultures; by studying the physical traits of humans; by studying languages; and by studying prehistory through archaeology and fossils. – Being an anthropologist is like being a detective who uses clues from both the modern world and the past to learn about our early human ancestors. If you like traveling, seeing new cultures, learning a new language, or searching for clues to solve puzzles, you’ll make a great anthropologist! Archeology – The study of ancient people and the world that they lived in. – They dig for fossils, look for new sites, explore and survey, analyze findings. – Archaeologists interact with other disciplines. Historical archaeology examines written records of the past Prehistoric archaeology examines fossils from before the written record Experimental archaeology simulates how ancient people lived – Hiking and searching to find new dig sites, using pickaxes and shovels to excavate fossils, putting clues together from fossil records to discover long-lost information from the past – these are the types of things an archaeologist does to learn about our early human ancestors.

16. Debate: Collective Learning