Dark tourism examples: Pompeii

Engage your KS3 students with one of the most compelling dark tourism examples in history as they investigate whether Pompeii is a site of tragedy or historical treasure.

What's included

• Google Earth GIS practice measuring pyroclastic flow distance from the crater to Pompeii
• Marketplace activity with four stations (eruption, houses, public buildings, art) for evidence gathering
• Geographical learning covering CLOCC descriptions, stratovolcano formation and pyroclastic flows

This resource includes a free PDF of the student worksheet and marketplace information handouts. The full lesson with PowerPoint presentation and editable versions of all worksheets and handouts is available exclusively to subscribers.

How to use this resource

Start with the definition activity to establish what dark tourism means, then build geographical knowledge through the CLOCC location task and volcano science activities. The Google Earth measuring exercise brings real-world GIS skills into your classroom, making the disaster's scale tangible. The marketplace activity works brilliantly as students move between stations, gathering evidence from multiple perspectives before reaching their own conclusion to the central enquiry question. This approach encourages critical thinking as students weigh up whether sites of historical tragedy should be viewed primarily as dark tourism destinations or windows into the past.

Looking for more like this?

This resource is part of a complete dark tourism series for KS3 Geography. Explore the other lessons:

• What is dark tourism?
• Dark tourism examples: 9/11 Memorial
• Dark tourism: Create your own brochure