Raphael's "School of Athens" Ties It All Together

Plato and Aristotle talking about big ideas

At Seabury School, we teach big ideas to little people. The first and second graders are finishing up a study of the Renaissance Period. Coupled with a study of inventions, we have covered higher level, challenging ideas, a perfect challenge for these gifted, highly capable young people. 

In order to do this, the teachers at Seabury use the Blooms Taxonomy of Educational Objectives "inverted pyramid" approach when developing our curriculum.

The chart on the left shows the regular Blooms Taxonomy. 
The chart on the right is the inverted pyramid. 

Research shows that with gifted students, more time should be invested on higher-level activities and objectives--analyzing, evaluating, and creating. For our students, knowledge in itself might not be completely satisfying. 

With this in mind, we are able to study topics that are usually studied much later than first and second grade, topics like the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, and also Inventions, a perfect tie-in to these time periods. 

As we finished up our QUEST to understand these topics, we asked the question, "How do these all fit together?"

We got out a long timeline and made some interesting discoveries.

• The US hasn't been around that long.
• The Middle Ages is in the middle of the Ancient History Period (Egypt, Greece and Rome) and the Renaissance.
• The Middle Ages was a time of survival. Not much time for art.
• The Renaissance is the rebirth of the Ancient History Period ideas.
• The Middle Ages was also called the Dark Ages. Now we know why.
• We learn what BC and AD mean and BCE and CE.
• There isn't a year "zero".
• We see where important inventions/inventors fit--Gutenberg, Leonardo da Vinci, Galileo, the Wright Brothers, Thomas Edison, etc.
• We get excited about studying the Explorers next year!

We then took a close look at Raphael's painting, "The School of Athens." We had a great analytical, evaluative discussion, a discussion that tied together what we've been studying all year.

• When was this painted?
• Where is it today?
• How big is it?
• Who are these people?
• When were these people alive?
• Who were Plato and Aristotle?
• Even though they were no longer alive, how did they effect Galileo's life? 
• What are the people doing? Holding? Why do you think they are holding these things? 
• Do you see Raphael's self portrait?
• What are the statues of?
• Notice the perspective of the room. Do you see the vanishing point? How is this different from the paintings from the Middle Ages?

"The School of Athens [1511] represents all the greatest mathematicians, philosophers and scientists from classical antiquity gathered together sharing their ideas and learning from each other.These figures all lived at different times, but here they are gathered together under one roof."

                                                            ~Khan Academy

Check out the interesting (at least to first and second graders 😉) Khan Academy lesson here.

We then got ultra creative (top level of Blooms Inverted Taxonomy!) and recreated the School of Athens in our classroom. 

• Plato and Aristotle are at the center, Plato on the left pointing up holding his book The Timaeus, Aristotle on the right pointing down holding his book called Ethics
• Pythagoras holding his big math book
• Euclid drawing a geometric design with an eager student watching and learning
• Ptolemy holding the globe
• Zoroaster holding a terrestrial sphere
• Diogenes casually sitting on the stairs
• Heraclitus, the ancient philosopher writing and lost in his own thoughts
• Students leaning against the wall and in a discussion
• Raphael himself peaking out on the right hand side

What a rich, exciting, educational QUEST we have been on this year. Most people I talk to say, "I never studied those things until college!" Well, these Seabury first and second graders now have a head start! And they have done a fine job, thank you. Inverted Blooms Taxonomy works!