The key trait that makes a hominoid a hominin is evidence for bipedalism. In this video experts discuss the physical changes that must occur for the transition to bipedalism including the more forward positioning of the foramen magnum, the large hole through which the spinal cord passes into the skull, a pelvis that becomes more bowl-shaped rather than the long blade-like pelvis of a chimpanzee, a longer leg, and a foot with springy arches. Important discoveries are examined in the time period from four to one million years ago including East African discoveries such as Australopithecus anamensis and the famous ?Lucy? specimen. The history of discovery in South Africa is reviewed starting with the first Australopithecus, the Taung child, and the more rugged genus Paranthropus. Finally, you will learn about the first member of our genus, Homo habilis.
Grade levels: Adult
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The New Hominin
About 1.8 million years ago, a new species of Homo appears in East Africa, a species that will exist longer than any other hominin. This lesson focuses on that new species: Homo erectus, the first hominin to leave Africa. In this lesson, you will follow the migrations of this species. You will explore the history of what paleoanthropologists have discovered concerning this widespread hominin in Java and in China and learn how the recent discoveries in the Republic of Georgia have turned much of what we knew about Homo erectus on its head. Finally, you will learn about a new type of tool industry that lasts for more than a million years.
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Premodern Humans
Around 780,000 years ago a new species of Homo appears, perhaps descended from the hominins that lived in Spain and Italy between 900,000 and 800,000 years ago. This time period, called the Middle Pleistocene, is marked by alternations of glaciations and interglacials. The new species is called Homo heidelbergensis. Around 125,000 Homo heidelbergensis gives rise to the Neandertals. The Neandertals are the main focus of this video lesson. You will see that the Neandertals were a robust people adapted for a cold, harsh environment. Their survival depended on more than just biology, however. A major factor to their survival was their stone tool culture, known as the Mousterian
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Homo Sapiens & the Upper Paleolithic
This lesson details the technological, artistic, and geographic expansion of the Cro-Magnons, the anatomically modern humans of Europe during the Upper Paleolithic era. The video details some of the major innovations, such as blade technique in which long, parallel-sided flakes are struck off the edges of a specially prepared core. It also details artistic endeavors of the Upper Paleolithic, beyond cave paintings, such as Venus figures. The geographic expansion during this time is also presented, highlighting the need for and development of a new technology used for their migration over open water. The video also illustrates the cognitive capacity of the Homo sapiens of the Upper Paleolithic, and how it allowed them to create technology that eased their daily survival.
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Food Domestication & The Emergence of Cities
This lesson explores how the accelerated rate of cultural change continued to drive human innovation in ways that transformed daily life for everyone. It illustrates the most radical cultural shift in the history of humankind that occurred in the Neolithic period (or New Stone Age), detailing the domestication of plants and animals and the shift to setting up permanent residences. The video concentrates on the Mayan civilization to explain the cultural changes that mark the differences between village life and urban settlements.
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Patterns of Variation
The video begins with comments on some instances of ethnic genocide that have occurred in the past in the Sudan, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Nazi Germany during World War II, and relates these occurrences to the concept of ?race,? a concept that is based on physical differences between groups. Briefly explains the historical context of how the concept of race emerged among European explorers during the sixteenth century. And, it explains that today anthropologists and scholars look beyond visible physical differences to explain human variation, that they analyze genetics and DNA, the cornerstone of genetic studies, to describe and understand human diversity. The video defines polymorphisms and clearly explains how their presence in human genotypes causes differences in phenotypic variation.
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Aged Care: Managing Incontinence
Urinary and faecal incontinence can be one of the most stigmatizing and embarrassing disabilities to afflict both men and women in society today. The causes and types of incontinence can be varied and can affect anyone at any age not just the young or the elderly. The cost to the individual can be measured in loss of confidence, embarrassment, social isolation, relationship stress and breakdown, not just in laundering and costs of continence products. However there is hope for individuals afflicted with incontinence. New therapies, products and appliances and building design can all assist the individual. This program will examine management strategies to assist individuals and their carers to maintain dignity and independence.
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Exploring Pathways in Hospitality and Tourism
Apprenticeships and traineeships combine work and structured training. Traineeships have many features in common with apprenticeships, although traineeships usually last only one to two years instead of three to four years. This program covers the skills and attitudes generally expected of an apprentice or trainee and illustrates four specific examples in the Tourism and Hospitality Industry.
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Preparing and Processing Foods
This program looks at why we preserve and process foods, how we do it in different cultures and the health considerations we need to take into account when we do it today. The preservation of food has been a life-saving practice in every human society since the dawn of time. In frozen climates, meat was kept in the ice. In tropical climates food was dried in the sun. In moderate climates salt and oil did the work. And this preservation allowed mankind to put down roots and create a society by remaining in one location. Each culture preserved their local food sources using the same basic methods of food preservation such as drying, freezing, fermenting, pickling and curing. But, within cultures, the preservation of food isn’t strictly for sustenance. There are also cultural aspects. All across the world there are many religious and celebratory occasions where the preservation of foods now has a social and customary meaning.
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The Beginning Teacher
The aim of this program is to provide strategies and advice to beginning teachers on how to prepare for their initial teaching appointment. All the research shows that the teacher is the most important factor in improved student learning. This program presents information and strategies to assist first time teachers upon their initial appointment.