paining of an ancient scene

This collection of teaching resources highlights historical connections between the Middle East and the wider world, including the region’s role in global exchange—from the travels of Ibn Battuta and Mansa Musa to the Indian Ocean cotton trade and the incense routes of the Arabian Peninsula. Materials include lesson plans and teaching units designed for middle and high school classrooms.

Tapestry of Travel

Teaching Module

This module, written by Karima Alavi for CCAS, provides an introduction to the contributions of Arab and Muslim civilizations to geography and world exploration, and introduces students to early travelers including Ibn Battuta, Hasan al-Wazzan, Mansa Musa, and multiple others. Click here for the PDF.

Cotton in the Global Economy: Mapping Material Culture Through Indian Ocean Trade

Teaching Unit

This teaching unit produced by CCAS explores Indian Ocean trade through the rise of cotton as a global commodity. It foregrounds the antecedents of Europe’s cotton industry and their contributions to industrialization. It is designed for students in 7th-12th grade. Click here for the teaching unit.

Beyond Ibn Battuta–The Indian Ocean Across Time and Disciplines

Video Series

The Summer Teacher Institute 2015 explored the Indian Ocean as a vibrant region of exchange and innovation in production of goods and technological advancement. The trade circuits of Afroeurasia were linked to global routes crossing the Atlantic and the Pacific, including those in Southeast Asia, Southwest Asia, South Asia, and East Africa. Today, the Indian Ocean is a microcosm of the globalized economy. Indian Ocean maritime trade in fossil fuels, minerals, tropical raw materials and commodities, as well as finished goods, are produced and transported through the Indian Ocean. About half of the world’s trade passes through crucial straits in Indian Ocean, joining the Pacific and Atlantic worlds as well as land-based economic activities in China, Southeast Asia, India, Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. The emergence of China and India as economic giants in the current century means intensification of activity in the region. STI 2015 aimed to expand attendees’ understanding of the global importance of the Indian Ocean beyond the distant past through interdisciplinary programming.
Click here to watch recorded lectures from STI 2015.

Geography of the Arabian Peninsula

Lesson Plan

This lesson, written by Joan Brodsky Schur for CCAS, introduces students to the physical geography of the Arabian Peninsula during the premodern era, its position relative to bodies of land and water, its climate, and its resources. Click here for the PDF.

The Incense Routes: Frankincense and Myrrh: As Good As Gold

Lesson Plan

This lesson, written by Joan Brodsky Schur for CCAS, on the trade of aromatic resins focuses on the origin of frankincense and myrrh in the Arabian Peninsula and the ways that demand for these aromatics integrated the peninsula into the trade routes of Eurasia. Click here for the PDF.