Nessus & The Death of Hercules

This lesson was designed for my GCSE Classical Civilisation class for their Myth & Religion Unit.

It’s fully dual coded to reduce cognitive load, increase engagement and aid knowledge retention. There are two handouts included as hidden slides for printing and each slide has a coloured overlay to help pupils with dyslexia / Irlen’s - which can be removed if you don’t need or want it.

The lesson picks up from where the last one (Hercules’ fight with Achelous) left off. It tells the story through Ovid of how Hercules came to meet Nessus on his way back to Tiryns with Deianira.

Students are then presented with a short passage from Ovid which they stick in their book, highlight and answer questions on (verbally or written - depending on how you want to run the lesson).

This is important as Nessus gives Deianira the cloak that will eventually kill Hercules - as is told in the next part of the lesson. Students are again presented with a (longer) passage from Ovid’s Metamorphoses which describes the lead up to Hercules’ death, and the death itself, in great detail.

Students are to highlight key information on their copy and use it to answer some written questions that gradually increase in the level of challenge posed - in order to stretch their thinking and allowing them to demonstrate the full extent of their understanding.

Finally, students are asked whether this is a fitting end to a hero such as Hercules, and what his death says about the relationships between the Olympian gods themselves.

Thanks for taking a look - it’s a really straightforward lesson which will fit into an hour if the first comprehension is done verbally, or can be stretched over two hours if the first comprehension is written (like the second) and you include the optional plenary at the end involving an obituary for Hercules :)