Egypt
A mini unit for grades K-2
This is a good unit to do the last week or two of school as it really holds student interest.
Background Information
Approximately 5,000 years ago the civilization of Egypt flourished
along the Nile river. It lasted over 3,000 years, longer than
most other civilizations in the world's history.
Egypt is an Arab state. It lies between
Africa and the Middle East. The Pyramids, the Sphinx and the
tomb of young King Tut are some of the attractions
that still excite and interest us today.
Vocabulary
AMUN-RE; God of the state of Egypt and of the sun.
ISIS; Wife of Osiris; goddess of magic and household
skills.
OSIRIS; God of the afterlife and protector
of kings.
SCARAB; Divine beetle considered to be a
form of the sun-god and symbol of creation. Lucky.
KING TUT; the most famous of all the pharaohs.
He was given the throne when he was approximately
eight-10 years old and ruled
only for 9 years. He died when he was 18-19 years
old. His tomb is famous for having
been found with all its treasures intact.
PYRAMID; building to contain the tomb of a pharaoh.
The most famous is the Great Pyramid of Khufu.
It has 2,300,000 blocks and each block in
the pyramid weighs 2.5 tons.
PHAROAH ; “the one who lives in the palace” or king. Egyptians
believed that it was the pharaoh’s job to serve the gods. They believed
that in return for the offerings of food and water that only the
pharaoh could make, the gods would care for the souls of the Egyptians after
death.
The pharaoh's power was almighty and unquestioned. Even accidentally
touching the pharaoh's crown or scepter carried the death penalty. The pharaoh's
chief duty was to build and maintain temples to the gods.
SPHINX; a mythological figure with the head of
a man and the body of a lion. Sculptors of
ancient Egypt modeled them with the king’s
face. The oldest is the Great Sphinx, which is about 240 ft. long
and 66ft high.
Background Mythology
Life in Egypt revolved around the Nile River and its annual
floods. Water was an important component of Egyptian
creation myths.
In one myth the sun god Ra, in his version as Khepri
(the scarab god) raises the world out of Nu ( a state
of water) and all things came out of Nu. Out of the watery chaos
of Nu, Khepri
causes
the other
gods to
come forth including Shu and Tefnut.
Shu and Tefnut brought out Nu’s eyes, the sun and the moon. Khepri
cried tears at the sight and from his tears sprung forth people.
After this Khepri created plants and animals. In the mean time, Shu and
Tefnut gave
birth to Geb and Nut, who in turn gave birth to Osiris and Isis.
In another myth about the creation of the sun Geb was
the earth. He often reclined under the sky goddess
Nut. Geb was called 'the Great Cackler', and was
represented as
a goose. He is
said to have
laid
the egg from which
the sun was hatched.
Social Studies
1. Students can make pyramids out of sugar cubes.
2. Students can pretend to attend market day and barter toys. Give
the students each a prize from the prize box and some assorted
candies. Divide the class in half. Half of the class sits on blankets
as the vendors.
The other half of the class wanders around trying to barter or
trade for what they would really like. On market day use a kohl liner
to rim the
students eyes so that they look like ancient Egyptians. For hygienic
reasons it’s best to have moms send in an eye pencil for their child. Add
some mood to market day by asking additional adults to join the fun. Have
one adult be a seer and have him make prophecies about the students. Have
another adult play the shell game with students. Students guess under
which of three cups a shell, rock or jewel is hidden.
3. The Egyptians' basic food and drink was bread and beer. There
were many kinds of sweet breads and cakes sweetened with honey
as there was no sugar. Eat a snack from Egypt such as crackers
and hummus, bread
and honey and grapes.
4. Ancient Egyptians enjoyed playing many board games. Senet
is an Egyptian board game that is an early version of backgammon.
The rules for these games have not survived. Have students
play backgammon and other
board games you have available in class.
Art
Egyptians drew themselves as a side profile. Have students try
drawing their self- portrait in the same style. Both men and
women lined their eyes with heavy black kohl. Have students do
the same for a distinctively
Egyptian look. Egyptian artists used the colors black, blue,
green,
grey, red, white, yellow and pink most often. Have your students
focus on these
colors. Men’s skin was usually colored red and women’s was
colored yellow.
Mummies often had a golden face mask if the person was wealthy enough. Let students make paper plate face masks and spray paint them gold.
The Curse of King Tut
The tomb of King Tutankhamun was discovered by Howard Carter. He
was given money for his search by Lord Carnarvaron.
Legend has it that anyone who dares to open a tomb will suffer
the wrath of the mummy. Mummies have been associated with many
magical powers. Many of the
mummies found from Egypt were ground into a fine power and sold as mummy powder.
It's believed the powder had magical healing powers.
The story behind the curse of King Tut began when Lord Carnavaron
was bit by a mosquito on the cheek. Later, Lord Carnavaron cut himself
on the cheek shaving
the same spot as the mosquito bite. The bite became infected and he became
ill and died. Howard Carter lived on for ten years after his discovery of the
tomb recording all the treasures.
Students will enjoy listening and dancing to Steve Martin’s song “King
Tut”.
Language Arts
At first modern people did not understand how to read hieroglyphs.
Then in 1799, a soldier digging a fort in Rosetta, Egypt found a large
black stone
with three different types of writing on it. The writing was a message
about Ptolemy V, who was the ruler of Egypt at the time. The message
was written
in three different languages- Greek, demotic and hieroglyphics. Finally
in 1822 an Egyptologist named Champollion figured out how to match up
the Greek
writing to the hieroglyphs and modern man was able at last to read hieroglyphics.
Have students recreate their names using hieroglyphs. They can pretend to be royalty by putting their name inside a cartouche, a vertical or horizontal oval. Names could be written horizontally from left to right, as we do, or from right to left. Names could also be written vertically, from the top down (but not from the bottom up). I have a set of hieroglyph stamps but you can also print out hieroglyphs from various sites. See resources.
Read books about King Tut and ancient Egypt.Students love to look at pictures of treasure and mummies. Give students several rolls of toilet paper and have them make you into a mummy.
Animals in Egypt
Animals were highly thought of in ancient Egypt and were well taken
care of. Animals that were associated with a particular god were housed
in temples to the god and fed and washed. Animals were even mummified.
Cats in particular were highly regarded because of the cult of
the cat goddess Bastet. She was the goddess of cats, women and
secrets. Cats wore jewelry and were allowed to eat from the same plate
as their owners.
When a pet cat died ancient Egyptians shaved their eyebrows off
as a symbol of their grief.
There is a story of how the army from Persia took advantage of
the Egyptians' love of the cat. They were attacking an Egyptian
fort when one of the Persians came up with the idea of throwing
live cats over the
walls. The Egyptians quickly surrendered the fort.
Have students practice drawing cats using directed drawing techniques. Check out the Do2Learn site for directed drawing pages on cats and other subjects,
Ancient Egyptian Life
Since Egypt was so hot most ancient Egyptians wore little or no
clothes at all. All clothes were almost always made of linen that
was made from flax. Flax is a plant having small leaves, blue
flowers and stems about
two feet tall. Flax was pulled out of the ground, not cut.
Flax stems were soaked for several days. The fibers were separated.
Then the fibers were beaten until soft. The spinner attached the
fibers to the spindle. The fibers were twisted into strong thread.
The weaving was done on a loom. White linen needed constant washing.
It was
washed in
the river or canal, rinsed, then pounded on a stone, and, bleached
in the sun.
Workers wore loincloths made of animal hide and linen. They also
wore simple tunic dresses. A loincloth is a piece of material fastened
around the waist and worn by men. Most of the slaves worked naked.
Better-off people
wore wide clothes of white cloth. Wealthy men or women wore long
transparent robes that were pleated. Both men and women wore wigs
made from human hair
or wool. People usually went barefoot and carried their sandals,
wearing them only when needed.
Whether you were rich or poor you wore jewelry such rings, necklaces
and ear studs. The wealthy wore jewelry made of gold and the less
wealthy used beads made from turquoise or lapis lazuli.
Both men and women made up their eyes and lips. Eyes were rimmed,
eyebrows were painted and lashes were darkened with a black powder
called kohl. They used a red cheek powder called ochre as blush.
They used a dye called henna to redden their nails and hair.
Students can make up their own eyes like ancient Egyptians using eye liner pencils. Make sure you have enough for each child to have his own. Eye pencils should not be shared for hygienic reasons. Have students bring one in from home and buy extras to keep on hand for those who forget.
Resources
Ancient Egypt coloring pictures; http://members.aol.com/FyreWyngz/cbook/cbook.html
King Tut site
http://www.kingtutone.com/tutankhamun/
For free graphics
http://www.neferchichi.com/
Hieroglyphs sites; use these to print out as a resource for kids
to cut and assemble their name.
http://www.neferchichi.com/hieroglyphs.html
http://www.neferchichi.com/hieroclip.html
The Disney movie and soundtrack; “The Prince of Egypt”
Games and Videos about Ancient Egypt
http://www.eyelid.co.uk/games.htm
The British Museum; online exploration of scenes from tomb walls
http://www.ancientegypt.co.uk/menu.html
Newton’s Apple; make a mummy with an apple
http://www.ktca.org/newtons/13/mummy.html
Mysteries of Egypt-terrific site with great photos and more.
http://www.civilization.ca/civil/egypt/egypte.html
Little Horus; online games, coloring, recipes, stories, information
about holidays and modern Egypt
http://www.horus.ics.org.eg/index.html
