Optional Activities
- Virtual Cave Tour: Visit the Lascaux virtual tour or the Chauvet Cave. Think about what you see, how you think it was made, and what you think it means.
- Prehistoric Music: The oldest musical instruments are bone flutes found in Germany and Slovenia, dating to 40,000–43,000 years ago. Search for recordings of music played on reconstructed prehistoric flutes. Music, art, and language all emerged around the same period, what might that tell us about the minds of early Homo sapiens?
- Cave Art Across Continents: Cave and rock art wasn’t only European. Explore the rock art of the Drakensberg in South Africa (San people, thousands of years old), Cueva de las Manos in Argentina (9,000 years old), and Murujuga in Australia (possibly 50,000 years old — among the world’s oldest surviving art). What themes appear in multiple cultures independently?
- Werner Herzog’s Cave of Forgotten Dreams (2010): This documentary films the actual Chauvet Cave, closed to the public. Watch clips on YouTube or stream the film. Herzog describes the paintings as evidence of “the modern human soul.” Do you agree? What would you say to the person who painted those horses 36,000 years ago?
- Practice Symbolic thinking: Cave art functioned as an ancient form of communication, utilizing a system of symbolic imagery to convey complex ideas without the use of written language. To explore this concept, you might challenge learners to represent abstract notions (such as danger, food, or family) through simple icons. This engaging exercise encourages participants to design their own visual symbols, describe their meanings verbally, or participate in matching games, effectively demonstrating how prehistoric people recorded information and narratives through the earliest foundations of literacy.
- Ritual Then and Now: Rituals are deeply ingrained human behaviors consisting of repeated actions imbued with shared meaning. Throughout history, ancient ceremonies served as essential practices to unite communities and mark significant life events. Similarly, modern society relies on daily rituals like signing our names to signify commitment, blowing out birthday candles, or wearing team logos. These things are anchored to our identities and shared experiences. Humans continue to repeat these deliberate actions because they foster a profound sense of belonging and provide a structured way to honor our values, memories, and connections within a group.To further explore this, brainstorm different rituals your learners see in their life.
- Practice Storytelling without Words: Choose one cave image (animal hunt, hand stencils, abstract shapes) and ask learners to tell a story using only gestures. As a fun extension you could also attempt to retell the same story using words, then compare.
- Cave Art Across Continents: Cave and rock art wasn’t only European. Explore the rock art of the Drakensberg in South Africa (San people, thousands of years old), Cueva de las Manos in Argentina (9,000 years old), and Murujuga in Australia (possibly 50,000 years old, among the world’s oldest surviving art). What themes appear in multiple cultures independently?
- Werner Herzog’s Cave of Forgotten Dreams (2010): This documentary films the actual Chauvet Cave, closed to the public. Watch clips on YouTube or stream the film. Herzog describes the paintings as evidence of “the modern human soul.” Do you agree? What would you say to the person who painted those horses 36,000 years ago?