Margery's Egypt Unit study

[canadian gardener]

I was talking to a friend who homeschools, and thought I'd put my list of books here as it was a fun unit and the kids really got something out of it.

Why this came up is because years later my adult son went to England and Europe this fall and he says what he brought me home as a gift was a book on translating heiroglyphics that he picked up from the British Museum where he spent many happy hours apparently.

His sister-- same trip, but they went separate ways hung out in the Egypt section of the Louvre over in Paris, and she just wrote me about that so

with that in mind, perhaps you too would like to stimulate life long interest in history and use the same books I did.

I based my unit on the one by Greenleaf Press called The Greenleaf Guide to Ancient Egypt. I followed the book guide, adding some of my own picks, and leaving others off. I didn't do the unit as recommended, as I tended to fly by the seat of my pants where homeschooling was concerned. Here is what I did with my kids.

First 2 outstanding fiction books (read aloud or assign) for the kids both by ELOISE JARVIS McGRAW from the Egyptian period of history: Mara daughter of the Nile AND The Golden Goblet both terrific.

And one by Agatha Christie, her only ancient Egyptian novel, called Death Comes As the End. Really thrilling mystery, good read aloud. Touching little romance, all ends happily.

The Kingfisher Illustrated book of World History is a wonderful resource to have on hand for any homeschool family. It is much more than dates, it has colourful sidebars and interesting crosslinkages of history. What happened at the same time in England and America? What was happening in Rome and Greece and around the rest of the Med at the time of Egypt's glory?

some books from the library that are outstanding:

Judy Donnelly, Tut's Mummy -- Lost and Found. This is written at a third grade level, but it's information is clear and fascinating even for adults. It's from the Random House STEP into Reading program. I have it in my collection and refuse to part with it and with the following books.

Another fascinating book on mummies is Nicholans Reeves book INTO THE MUMMIES TOMB printed 92. Terrific text and pictures it explains the Carter expedition when Tut's tomb was uncovered and explored. Jr high level in the text but the pictures will grab any child or adult.

If we are really into mummies, then Mummies Made in Egypt by Aliki Brandenberg is recommended ages 8 -12. When I did this unit with my jr high kids, this is the only book I substituted and I used Mummies, Myth and Magic by Christine El Mahdy pub 1989. Fascinating photos and text, well written for high school age.

A Landmark book from Random House that is from 1964 and has been reprinted many times since is Elizabeth Payne's The Pharaohs of Ancient Egypt. Read aloud a chapter a day. Not as riveting as some of the others but more thorough. Very good chronology of the different Pharaohs and who ruled when and what were the highs and lows of their time.

David Macaulay: Pyramid. David's art and cutaways are really fascinating. A real MUST this one will pull your child into the time period with it's detail and interest. There are videos based on these books that you can sometimes find in a library. PBS had them on TV a few years back.

3 From USBORNE BOOKS (sometimes you can get them, sometimes not)

Time Traveller Book of Pharaohs and Pyramids by Tony Allan (usborne)this is the early elementary school version.

Early Civilization by Jane Chisholm is the older el, early jr high version by usborne and it covers more than Egypt. You find some good stuff on Assyria, Babylon, and other middle East empires that are often left out.

Deserts by Angela Wilkes, also Usborne is an elementary school look at life in the desert, animals, plants etc. Good little bit of biology to tack into the unit on Egypt.

Judith Crosher's See Through History of Ancient Egypt (hamlyn childrens books in 92, printed by Penguin thru Viking books in 93. THIS HAS A WONDERFUL RELIEF MAP of Ancient Egypt on Page 5.

FINALLY The Cultural Atlas for Young People has some WONDERFUL books in the series. Ancient Egypt by Geraldine Harris is outstanding. I collected almost all of these books, some at library book sales, others I bought to go with various units for history. They have good timelines, excellent maps, many in relief which helps kids visualize maps, and with little sidebars and great pictures.

One I couldn't get hold of was by R J Unstead. Egypt and Mesopotamia pub by A&C Black in 1977. LOOK FOR ANYTHING BY UNSTEAD as he is a terrific writer for kids and draws them into historical periods without any effort by the teacher.

More in a minute

[canadian gardener]

OK you may notice that I GASP used "baby books" or shall we politely say, books written for early elementary students.

I was teaching gr 7 and 9 at the time.

I would have used them even if they were in Gr 11 and 12.

WHY?????

Because it's a Ruth Beechick tip I picked up and used successfully.

Kiddie books are written very clearly, without a lot of confusing or complicated sentence structure and they are profusely illustrated. This means that when you are teaching for content, the kids you are teaching "get it". They get it ALL!

Ruth recommends and I second it, that you pick some books out that teach what you want the kids to learn at a reading level WELL BELOW their current ability.

Then get some AT their current level.

Use both. Use some books for their maps and illustrations only, others for the timelines, others for the text.

That way you get the info into the kid in a way that is permanent. And we all know that the goal is learning that sticks. It doesn't matter how many times you work over a period if you are using boring material. That won't stick. Make it fun and make it permanent. Saves time and effort for mum and kid.

Make it fun and make it stick.

[canadian gardener]

I also used a selection of National Geographic magazines, and maps.

When teaching this unit, I stapled several maps up on the wall of the bathroom and put many of the picture history books like the Usborne, the Kingfisher book and the Cultural Atlas on the back of the toilet tank. Oh and the Nat'l Geo's too.

We also had a time line in the Greenleaf book and in the Usborne books that we referred to.

Use a time line, so the kids can see WHEN something happened, point it out after reading the fiction for example and paste it on the time line on the wall (which I did later)

AND

Use MAPS and a globe so the kids can see WHERE something happened, again paste or write in where the action happened in the story.

[canadian gardener]

We took the relief map of Egypt out to the lake one day (weekdays, the parks are deserted!) and sculpted a copy of the map in the sand at the beach.

Kids had fun, the dog found a dead fish and it was a great fall day with clear skies and sparkling colours.

Greenleaf recommended I make a salt dough map but I thought the beach was less messy.

It was, sort of unless you count the dead fish, which fortunately we got to the dog BEFORE he rolled in it.

[canadian gardener]

DD got a book from the library(I suspect it's an early version of the one DS says he bought for me) in which it showed her how to write heiroglyphics, the common symbols and also hieratic which is a different form of writing. Egypt had both.

She enjoyed playing with that.

[canadian gardener]

Lastly one of my reading techniques which drove my kids wild.

I would read a chapter book to them, and leave off in the MIDDLE of the tense and exciting bits!!!!!

MEAN MUM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

heheheheheh

They would sneak into the book later and read it on their own, but then sit still while I read it (getting it twice mind you!!!!) again for fear of letting me know they had sinned and stolen a peek.

This ensured that they got a lot of reading done, and that stuff was repeated in an interesting way.

I'm not dumb. I'm fiendishly clever at times when it came to motivating my darlings.

They never suspected it was all my evil plot to get them to learn!!!!!

[homesteadmamma]

Margery, thanks. I'm that homeschooling mom Margery was talking about and all I can say is "your the best". Dd is going to be delighted.

[forestdale]

Margery, I'm not a homeschooler but I just had to tell you that I agree with you about reading books from all age groups. My sons are both good readers, Shane has bult himself a nice little library, including some first editions. When they were younger I encouraged them to read everything that was in front of their faces. I do that - if there are words in front of me, I read them. I can't get enough. Some of the other mothers thought that allowing them to read comic books, newspapers or computer games (the early ones had text bubbles intstead of sound) was counter productive. My thought then and now was that to read anything that you got information from, was good. The end resullt is that they are now both selective readers and usually go looking for the information they need in books. So I agree that it doens't matter what age level it's aimed at, if the message is clear and one worth reading, then it's a worthwhile book.

My son Kerry, the one that's now in Canada, was in London in 2003. He loved the British Museum and spent many hours wandering through looking at the Egyptian section, the Rosetta stone, Queen Nefertiti's mask etc. He brought me back a small cast bronze cat, fashioned on those in the pharoah's tombs. I've been to the British Museum myself, but in those days they didn't have the amount of interesting merchandise they sell now.

I love how you share your homeschooling knowledge with the ladies here. I never homeschooled but I'm sure it would be confusing at times. Having information from someone who's done it successfully would be invaluable.

[canadian gardener]

thanks Rhonda and CJ, I appreciate those kind words, and I love to share stuff that was fun, worked well, and was easy to do.

I agree Rhonda, I let mine read all kinds of stuff, whatever they wanted. I still have dishpans full of old comics, and the Asterix series which I should have mentioned because some of it is actually a good addition to history and makes the kids think.

Getting them reading for pleasure and getting them learning stuff for it's own sake for the pleasure of collecting information!

Nothing to do with horrid little "teaching comprehension" stuff in the English texts. If you open the door to the world of books, and don't bore them with fussy adult's ideas of what kid's should read then they roar ahead.

[hollyhill]

Oh Thank-you!!!!!!!

We are Studying Egypt right now !!!!!
I am reading the usborne books to my 11 and 8 year old and my 14 year old is working her way through KONOS world history 1.
Sure wish I could buy the Greenleaf press guide to Ancient Egypt. But my curriculum budget is zero (Dh is retraining in school full time after losing his job last year.)
But I have saved your novel recomendations and will order them right away.
Thank-you so much!!!!!!!
Have you done any other Unit Studies that you have posted here? How would I find them?

[Early Bird]

Except for the specific books, we could apply some of these techniques to a lot of studies -- Vikings, for example. (Take it away, Margery!)

[QuilterMom]

Originally posted by forestdale

My son Kerry, the one that's now in Canada, was in London in 2003. He loved the British Museum and spent many hours wandering through looking at the Egyptian section, the Rosetta stone, Queen Nefertiti's mask etc. He brought me back a small cast bronze cat, fashioned on those in the pharoah's tombs. I've been to the British Museum myself, but in those days they didn't have the amount of interesting merchandise they sell now.

I've been there and that was my favorite part as well!

[QuilterMom]

Thanks Margery! I did units for ds in preschool, but am using mostly prepackaged curriculum for everything right now as my plate is pretty full. We are doing units for science this year (1st grade) that I put together myself and ds loves it. He begs to do science.

I'm also a firm believer in them having their nose creammed in a book. Ds is reading on about a 7th grade level and people that hear him read aloud seem amazed.

Seeing this unit posted made me think of the Magic Tree House series of books that ds enjoys so much and they have really sparked his interest in learning about so many different things. So many companion research books are starting to come out for the books in the series and ds loves those as well (I don't agree with all the info in some of them though).

[canadian gardener]

Originally posted by hollyhill
Oh Thank-you!!!!!!!

We are Studying Egypt right now !!!!!
I am reading the usborne books to my 11 and 8 year old and my 14 year old is working her way through KONOS world history 1.
Sure wish I could buy the Greenleaf press guide to Ancient Egypt. But my curriculum budget is zero (Dh is retraining in school full time after losing his job last year.)
But I have saved your novel recomendations and will order them right away.
Thank-you so much!!!!!!!
Have you done any other Unit Studies that you have posted here? How would I find them?

Hollyhill, you are welcome. Yes I've done others, not posted, but I posted my "system" such as it is here as my easy method to homeschool.

I tried prepackaged units and hated them. They were more fiddly than textbooks. With the Greenleaf studies, I basically used their reading lists, not the study.

You pretty much have it right here.

And in a nutshell, Greenleaf does a chapter per lesson of the books (mostly reprints) that they have as a companion volume. The Old Testament used the Bible, and the Egypt study used the Pharaohs of Ancient Egypt book, and that was the only variation from their reprints of Famous Men of "Greece" or Rome, or Middle Ages etc.

Toss in a salt dough map of the region, and a time line that the kids put together of the period and you have it.

I liked Valerie Bendt's stuff on putting together your own unit studies, so I blended resources like the Greenleaf stuff (took what I wanted, left the rest) and did things with the kids that they liked and I could handle ie instead of salt dough, we went to the lake and used the wet sand at the beach to sculpt a map.

I couldn't always get the books from the library, so I learnt to substitute (if I recall the Aliki book was impossible to find so I found one that taught the same thing as above, at a jr high level).

I HATED the fuss and bother of the pre packed units (I tried Far Above Rubies, Konos, and the Little house on the Prairie one) with trying to get the recommended reading list books in all at the right time to do the unit.

So some I bought, but others I just methodically went thru the history and geography sections in the kiddie section first (easy reading, same content, better pictures) then in the adult section.

At home I'd leave some out to entice the kids in some dishpans facing the room, some in the bathroom along with the toilet tank collection of the moment, and others I assigned bits and peices for reading.

Fiction I'd read aloud a chapter or so, leaving off in the suspense bits.

That's pretty much it.

No cutting pasting and gluing.

Oh pointing out where on the globe, and atlas/maps etc, and when on the timeline was also a must.

But that is it.

I found it much easier than the projects that required so dang much teacher prep time in the prepacked unit studies and the teachers manual of the text books.

If the kids wanted to write about the period they could in their writing but I didn't demand it. As long as they wrote stuff every day I didn't care if it was a topic we were "doing" or if it was just something completely different that interested them.

[hollyhill]

Oh, I understand fully! And that is what I am doing with the younger ones. I don't like prepackaged stuff because of all the busy work. But for some reason my eldest craves this stuff now. But because she is able to do the prep work, library ordering, crafts etc all by herself she has my blessings. Same with science. She loves science and has been very well read in many areas of science but this year she craved more structure plus labs so she is doing Apologia which was lent to us. She is zooming through physical science and can't wait to do biology (which means I have to order the disection specimens soon, ugh).
My children have always been taught at home and I have loosely followed the Charlotte mason method (reading great books). The results are now bearing fruit. They love science and history and literature. LOVE IT.

So my Gr. 9 er has opted to avoid a pre designed program by the government to design her own. And this is the route she is taking. With the aim of reading University level Science texts soon.

My younger ones are still doing the lets read this great book together thing. Which is why I always appreciate recomendations.