Heracles and the Temple of Zeus at Olympia / Olympic Games

I used this lesson with my students for their OCR Classical Civilisation 9-1 GCSE unit ‘Myth and Religion’.

It covers what they need to know about Heracles apart from his twelve labours (which are covered in this lesson: https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-12658219 )

The lesson begins with a look at what Olympia was and why it was important to the Greeks. There is a video embedded and pupils are asked to describe what they can see in the reconstruction of Olympia on screen.

Heracles’ link to Olympia is then emphasised through a quick recap of his fifth labour, the Augean Stables, and the concept of metopes is introduced and where they are located on the Olympian Zeus temple.

Pupils are then presented with a discussion of the three aims of the sculptor in representing each of Heracles’ labours and are invited to make a reasoned judgement as to what they believe the sculptor’s primary aim was and explain why.

There is then a brief digression into the ‘other’ story of how the Olympic games were founded (Pelops, Hippodamia and Oinomaos) and pupils are shown where and how these events were depicted on the Temple of Zeus at Olympia.

The final task in this lesson that is designed to fit into an hour is one where pupils conclude which story of the origin of the Olympic Games is more likely to their mind, based on the literary and archaeological evidence.

Short exam practice questions are used as a plenary so that you as the teacher can assess what knowledge they’ve retained from the lesson.

The whole lesson is dual coded - something my students really enjoy as it facilitates a reduction in cognitive load and allows them to focus on exactly what needs to be focused on, by eliminating excess ‘noise’ from what is being presented.

This in turn we have found aids knowledge retention and allows them to link back to prior learning more readily, meaning they are making bigger learning gains from lesson to lesson.

A coloured overaly is included on each slide which can be easily deleted if you do not want or need it, but we have found these help our pupils with dyslexia / Irlen’s to engage more easily.

Thanks for taking a look :)