This week’s featured video is from The Baldwin School in Pennsylvania and received an Honorable Mention. Viewers are taken to a modern construction site where the architectural features of the past are shown to inspire the present. The ingenious film was created by middle school students Margaret, Emma (Karly), Charisma and Paige with the help and inspiration of their teacher, Preston Bannard.
After studying Roman architecture during the semester, the students concluded that the Romans influenced modern day superstructures all over the world. They wanted their video to explore this influence as well as all of the ways in which the Romans created massive architectural projects without the use of modern tools.[1] They came up with the idea of having the audience sit in on a meeting in which a planning committee is designing a new stadium using the Roman Coliseum as a model. Each element of the ancient structure is examined and updated as needed to accommodate a modern sport and crowd. The contrasts and comparisons are plain to see and the students easily demonstrate that our modern stadiums are similar in many ways to the enduring and ancient home of the gladiatorial games.
The students learned all about ancient Roman construction techniques. They were delighted to discover similarities to today, such as the use of awnings on the Coliseum to protect people from the sun just as we 21st century sports devotees have on many of our large structures. “The Romans inspired us,” the students wrote in their analysis. “They were very intelligent people…who put much thought into everything they made. And they did all of it without bulldozers or any of the modern technology that helps us today.”[2]
Before viewing the Coliseum through the eyes of modern stadium architects, take a moment to learn a bit more about these hard-working students.
Margaret likes to read and her favorite book is The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. She has one sister.
Emma (Karly) has one brother and two dogs. She enjoys playing the sport squash.
Charisma admires Roman history and the lingua latina (the Latin Language). She is very athletic and considers herself quite outgoing.
Paige has two brothers and a dog named Milo. She plays loves to play basketball.
[1] Film Essay.
[2] Ibid.
AntiquityNOW 