Days 6-10

Focus: Developing the habit of sourcing texts as a pre-reading skill. Continuing to corroborate across sources and collect evidence to support claims that address the second essential question

Sources Used:
Source F: Hymn to the Nile (primary source from 2100 BCE excerpted from textbook Volume I: The Ancient World, 1907)
Source G: Advice to the Young Egyptian: “Be A Scribe” (from Worlds of History: A Comparative Reader: Volume One, by Kevin Reilly, pages 62-65)
Source H: The Life of Meresamun: A Temple Singer in Ancient Egypt

Activities:
1. Before closely reading Hymn to the Nile, preview the text and reflect on three questions: Who wrote this? When was it written? What type of text is this?Discuss why it’s important to determine the origin of a document.
2. Closely read Hymn to the Nile with multiple purposes, focusing on confirming/disconfirming students’ assumptions about the source’s origin via reasoning through textual evidence as well as addressing the second essential question (what was life like for ordinary people?)
3. Write one claim about life in ancient Egypt based on evidence from this source. Explain how the evidence supports your claim.
4. For the next two texts (Advice to Young Egyptians; Life of Meresamun) follow the same process as above, pre-reading each document to determine the origin and then closely reading to confirm/disconfirm students’ assumptions about the source’s origins and to collect evidence to address the second essential question (what was life like for ordinary people?)
5. Collaboratively write a list of claims about life in ancient Egypt based on evidence collected from all three sources.

Classroom Products:
Sources Historians Use chart