1º British: Shackleton and the exploration of the Antarctica (II_ArtBook)

Breaking news! On March, 2022 a group of scientists discovered into the deep blue the Endurance, the legendary ship that famous British explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton lost in his last and tragic expedition, more than a century ago.

As you can imagine by this introduction, your new task this year is to do a work about it but… in a quite special and different way. Are you prepare for a bit of DIY? J

What do you have to do?

Your duty is to CREATE AN ART BOOK. And what is that? An artbook is a special book edition about a topic or concept, generally interactive, portable and easily shared; these special, unique editions are Works of Art by themshelves (not just a conventional book for reading) and can be made from a variety of materials, even become sculptural objects. These photo-collage will show you some inspirational examples:

Your new task (individual or in groups of maximum 4 people) is to create an artbook about the explorations on Antarctica. Of course, proper explanations about the topic will be provided at class and so you them put all that information in an artistical book-shape.

It is not necessary to write by your own all the information (exceptionally, this time you can copy&paste from internet, but  of course it would be necessary to do a previous good selection of the information and a good choice of typography and format!) because this work is about information management, edition technology and creativity, so… enjoy! J

 

Contents that MUST appear on your artbook (of course you MUST include images and maps):

• Phisical map of Antarctica
• Antarctica natural enviroment: climate (do not forget to include a climate graph), landscapes and animals.
• Predecessors: Scott and Amundsen expeditions (brief biographies, portraits, basic info about their expeditions and comparative map)
• Shackleton (short biography, portrait)
• Shackleton’s team
• Shackleton’s ship (Endurance). Photos, itinery and map.
• Antarctica today, a brief summary (Questions that you have to answer here: What is the Treaty of Anstarctica? What are the basic rules for international cooperation there? What are the Spanish projects?)
• Your opinión about the explorers and the activity.
• Colophon (What is a colophon?)

 

Extra ITC’s tip! You can also add web links or… even convert them into QR codes by using free online apps such as monkey or bitly generator! After the conversion, just print and add the QR image into your artbook J

When finish, give handly your artbook to your teacher. As usual, this work is mandatory and you will receive a mark for it; if you do not do it, or do it out of time, your mark will be 0.

 

Ok, now we know what to do but… what about the theory? Read HERE!

1º British: Shackleton and the exploration of the Antarctica (I_Theory)

Let’s start! What do you know about Antarctica? Antarctica is the continent surrounding the South Pole, almost entirely covered by an ice sheet. Here you have a detailed phisical map of it:

 

Antarctica is the coldest, highest, windiest, driest continent on Earth, as you can discover in this link about its environment and it is home of animals such as penguins, seals, whales… as you can watch in this Nationalgeographic video.

Antarctica was always an atractive dream for explorers, adventurers and scientists. Among History, there have been many travels, starting as soon as  the 18th century! On January 1774 James Cook (UK) crossed the Antarctica Polar Sea Circle but could not even see the continente due to the bad weather conditions (he was just 75 miles away from it!).

On November, 1820 Andrés MacFarlane (Chile) was the first person that disembarked in Antarctica (Expedition “Dragón de Valparaíso”).

Nevertheless, the most famous and hazardous Antarctica stories were the explorations of Scott (UK), Amundsen (Norway) and Shackleton (UK), al lof them at the beginning of the 20th century. These are their portraits:

Captain Scott and Roald Amundsen both aimed to be the first to reach the South Pole in 1911. That was nicknamed “The race to the South Pole” (Link to video and map).

Who won? Amundsen! On 14 December, 1911 he reached the center of the continent; When Scott arrived few weeks later, on 17 January 1912, the Norwegian flag was already there…

The journey back (on foot!) was not only sad for Scott and his men, but also terrible due to heavy snow storms and lack of food: they died before reaching back their ship in the coast. A posterior expedition managed to reach their last refugee, buried their bodies and recovered their diaries, that were published when back in London and become best-sellers.

But let’s focus on Shackleton’s last atempt: the Endurance voyage; although the expedition failed and the ship sunked, the adventure of the Endurance was probably one of the most remarckable historical hits in Geographical expeditions. And, spoiler, despite the difficulties all members of the team survived and went back to UK thanks to the determination and effort of the captain, Sir Ernest Shackleton!

Thanks to the NOVAproject website you would find a lot of information and visual resources for your work, such as the timeline and the team. Additionally, you can revise the National Geographic summary.

A real adventure, isn’t it? But what about now a days situation? Currently, Antarctica is a continente for international cooperation in science, where Spain is also collaborating.