QR Challenge: Medicine in the Ancient World

Created using the ClassTools QR Treasure Hunt Generator

Teacher Notes

A. Prior to the lesson:

1. Arrange students into groups. Each group needs at least ONE person who has a mobile device.

2. If their phone camera doesn't automatically detect and decode QR codes, ask students to

• Download a QR reader (e.g. I-Nigma | NeoReader | Kaywa) onto their mobile devices
• Bring these devices into the lesson.

3. Print out the QR codes.

4. Cut them out and place them around your class / school.

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B. The lesson:

1. Give each group a clipboard and a piece of paper so they can write down the decoded questions and their answers to them.

2. Explain to the students that the codes are hidden around the school. Each team will get ONE point for each question they correctly decode and copy down onto their sheet, and a further TWO points if they can then provide the correct answer and write this down underneath the question.

3. Away they go! The winner is the first team to return with the most correct answers in the time available. This could be within a lesson, or during a lunchbreak, or even over several days!

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C. TIPS / OTHER IDEAS

4. A detailed case study in how to set up a successful QR Scavenger Hunt using this tool can be found here.

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Questions / Answers (teacher reference)

Question	Answer
1. How did Claudius Galen develop the ideas of Hippocrates?	use of opposites
2. What was Hippocrates’ theory of the four humours?	phlegm, blood, black bile, yellow bile liquids in the body – idea of balance
3. How did the River Nile influence an Egyptian idea about the cause of disease?	blocked irrigation channels - blocked channels in the body
4. What was trepanning and why may it have been performed?	scraping hole in the skull to release evil sprits
5. Who was Claudius Galen?	a famous Greek doctor in Roman times
6. Who was the Greek god of healing?	Asclepios
7. Why did the Roman Empire collapse?	invasion of barbarian tribes
8. Name two groups of people from recent times that historians have looked at to help learn about prehistoric medicine.	Australian Aborigines, Native American Indians
9. Name three Greek philosophers.	Plato, Aristotle, Socrates
10. How could visiting an Asclepion temple involve both spiritual and natural ideas?	pray to the gods, rest & relaxation
11. Why did the Egyptians know a little but not a lot about anatomy?	embalming but no dissection
12. What were two problems of Roman public health?	Outbreaks of plague, sewers sometimes spread disease. Roman public health schemes were the best there had been but they were not perfect.
13. Explain the four stages of clinical observation.	D P O T
14. Why did Galen have such an influence on medicine for over 1000 years?	‘the creator’, complete theory of medicine
15. Why did the Romans want to protect the public’s health?	To uphold the empire
16. How might prehistoric man have treated a broken bone?	mud cast
17. Name four Roman public health facilities.	aqueducts, baths, toilets, sewers
18. What was the Egyptian system of writing called?	hieroglyphics
19. Which word describes what happened to medicine after the collapse of the Roman Empire?	Regression
20. After the collapse of the Roman Empire, its lands became dominated by two great religions. What were they?	Islam & Christianity

 

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