Medieval Europe: Castle Design & Anatomy

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When we think of Medieval Times, castles and fortresses grace the covers and pages of this part of history. Many of these structures still stand all over Europe. It seemed the natural order to begin the study with castles and we used the talented David MacCaulay to introduce us to the art and architecture.

David MacCaulay has written and illustrated a series of books about The Way Things Work. When I looked into his Castle book, I found his travel video A Unicorn Project which combines his tours through castles in Europe as well as his illustrated cartoons depicting a story of the times. Split into four 15 minute segments, we started our Castle introduction with The Unicorn Project.

The Unicorn Project https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvrKBf_CTVI

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Next, we looked up the anatomy of a castle. The kids used Calligraphy to write out parts of a castle and their function.

Afterwards, they were assigned to design a castle using the anatomy list, to include important elements that helped a castle function as a defense against the enemies.