Ancient History, Week 7

Ancient Egyptians & The River Nile

There are so many great resources for ancient Egypt that our studies will span several weeks. This week, we focused on the basics of ancient Egyptian life and the importance of the Nile River.


Tuesday

• Read Usborne: Ancient World by Fiona Chandler (pages 10-11).
• Completed corresponding Blue House School ancient world worksheets.
• Completed HO map work for Lesson 5, Main Lesson.
• Read "The Farmer" (page 6) from Voices of Egypt by Kay Winters.

Wednesday

• Read Bill and Pete Go Down the Nile by Tomie dePaola via YouTube video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OedouFBB4Q8.
• Completed Evan-Moor History Pockets: Ancient Civilizations, Grades 1-3 "Ancient Egypt" student booklet, words to know, and Nile River paper project (or eBook).

Bill and Pete Go Down the Nile didn't come in time for me to pick it up from the library, so I had to improvise. I found a great visual presentation of the book on YouTube. However, I wasn't fond of the creator's narration. I ended up using SaveVid.com to download the video to my laptop, then I transferred it to my Kindle Fire. I turned down the volume and read it myself to Tessa.

Tessa created an accordion-style paper brochure of sorts as part of her "Ancient Egypt" history pocket. It explains and depicts how the ancient Egyptians used the Nile's vast resources to survive and prosper.

Thursday

• Read Usborne Beginners: Egyptians by Stephanie Turnbull.
• Read The Winged Cat: A Tale of Ancient Egypt by Deborah Nourse Lattimore.
• Read Muti's Necklace: The Oldest Story in the World by Louise Hawes.
• Completed draw and color.

Friday

• Read "The Nile River" (page 26) and "Food" (page 40) from Modern Rhymes About Ancient Times: Ancient Egypt by Susan Altman.
• Completed "Make a Model of the Nile" from the SOTW activity guide.

I know Tessa would have loved to have gone all-out and created a larger, more elaborate scene of the Nile River. Anything she can recreate in miniature is exactly her kind of thing. Unfortunately, the weather here is beyond nippy now most days...not exactly hospitable enough to keep this project outside. We only have one window in our house that gets morning sun and has a shelf nearby, so we needed to create a very small, simple version of the Nile. Our supplies were minimal...a small disposable rectangle pan, aluminum foil, soil/sand, rocks from the driveway, and an old Duplo crocodile (okay, it's really an alligator...close enough). Most items we had on hand.

Tessa began by scooping a mixture of sand and dirt into a small disposable pan. 

After helping Tessa fashion a river bed from aluminum foil, she added pointed white rocks from our driveway in Upper Egypt to stand in as snow-capped mountains. Then, she sprinkled grass seed onto the banks of her soon-to-be Nile to mimic the planting of crops. 

After adding a Duplo crocodile, Tessa gently flooded her Nile River. (Personally, I think the Nile should have been flooded before planting the crops since this step is technically out of sequence, but we followed the directions anyway.) 

Tessa's flooded Nile River. (We added a lot more grass seed after this pic was taken.) She'll continue to flood it once a week until her crops are ready for harvest.

Tessa's Nile River two-and-a-half weeks later. Crops are ready for harvest! Quick note...we ended up watering this more than once a week.

* HO = History Odyssey, SOTW = The Story of the World