Summer Reading Camp reads Zilpha Keatley Snyder's The Egypt Game

Our 11 year old reader's school-assigned summer reading for beginning 6th grade is The Egypt Game. My kids half a generation ago read this novel at that age, I remembered as I re-read it. It's a little dated. We still found it to be a fun hook for the upcoming year's social studies curriculum in the ancient civilizations and mythologies.

Here are activities we did to increase our reader's motivation and daily anticipation of what would happen in "Egypt" today!

"Hieroglyphics"

I'm proud to share that our reader was inspired, all on his own, to create a hieroglyphic alphabet to use for secret messages--many chapters before the kids in the book thought of it!

alphabet letters and pictograms drawn in pencil by a child

Egyptian Feast

Dining table behind a string curtain, before a gold draperied window

We prepared some Egyptian recipes, in a basic, homemade approximation. I've attempted Northern African cooking and spice mixes before, for a Casablanca Valentine's Day celebration with my grown children. It's one of my son's favorite cuisines, thanks to many wonderful authentic local restaurants.

Our current reader however is a very picky eater. He refuses new foods presented at home or restaurants. But for some reason at our annual reading camp, he delights in wowing his parents by reporting the novelties he tried with us.

He liked koshari, and even requested it again the next day! The dish is a warmly spiced comfort food of rice, lentils, pasta and chickpeas. He ate the chicken kebabs and kofta. He liked the pita style bread, and drank tea. He was unsure about dates, and turned down eggplant and hummus.

table setting, pottery pitchers and urns

I wrote a menu in his invented hieroglyphs on an onionskin scroll, and set the table with lots of gold and black, jewel tone colors, urns and pots, pottery plates, "firebowl" candles, orchids, and some totems and stylized sculptures.

Processions, Prostration, Hide and Seek with "Security"

Besides food, we always need lots of physical activity between chapters.

We held processions. My reader had to learn and act out the word "prostrated".

The little brother of one character carries a security plushie around, an octopus named Security. My reader named our own guest Octavius. We took turns hiding and finding him one day, after the chapters where Security goes missing, and is found in a mysterious place.

Assembling a Pyramid

I provide a square plate as a base and a sack of oranges, and had our reader guess the number of oranges he needed to make a pyramid. He guessed wrong but successfully built a pyramid (three levels took 14 oranges...it will be a math formula to learn eventually...).

Thoth's Choice

In the book, the kids use a taxidermy owl to represent Thoth, whom they employ as an "oracle".

Our table included Thoth, and we sought the oracle's direction as to who should read each of the next chapters, (student aloud, teacher aloud, silent reading, student's choice).

Table setting, pyramid of oranges, statuettes and dishes

Wooden puzzle box on table, decorated with ancient Egyptian style drawings

Pharaoh's Tomb puzzle box

Setting the Mood with Puzzles, Movies, Music

Box picture, 300 piece puzzle, Ancient Egypt pharaoh tomb, sun and moon, Egyptian deities

Ancient Egypt Artifacts Jigsaw Puzzle:
We're still working on this, after we concluded reading!

poster of Karloff as The Mummy, ancient Egyptian woman

Since we were suffering a heat wave, we were indoors in air conditioning for some of our reading.It was helpful to catch some Mummy movie clips about archeologists and tomb raiding imperialists, to understand the costumes the kids in the book sought to achieve, and to see the artwork to understand why the children played at walking in the peculiar way they did.

We even caught a clip of Steve Martin's King Tut routine on Saturday Night Live, and listened to the Bangles performing Walk Like an Egyptian.

In the trick or treat chapter, we shared Halloween candy, (still got leftovers!). We celebrated the final chapter with the Christmas cookies and cider, just like the characters.

Controversies

Banned Book

What a learning opportunity for both of us! I shared with our reader that The Egypt Game is a "banned book" in many places.

I hadn't anticipated how very challenging it was for our child reader to understand the distinctions between his taste in a book, literary critique of a book, and the removal or destruction of a book to render it unavailable or illegal to read. This made for the most interesting discussions, always asking for him to explain the "why" of his opinion.

I was even more surprised to learn that our student, who can so faithfully recite the Bill of Rights after learning about the American Revolution in school this past year, had not understood that "free speech" may include books and writings.

I did reflect on the question of cultural appropriation in our activities or even in the novel. The book was a school assignment, not our choice. We had some fun and participated in the children's awe while they engaged in their pretend play. We playfully introduced the popular cultural perception of the ancient history and civilization, and affirmed that Egypt the place, culture and people are with us today. I used a history timeline book and even trusty World Book.

My daughter as a tot used to play the Catholic Mass with stuffed animals and dolls, and, once reading, wrote her own additional book of the Bible. I could see she was learning.

We did our best.

I neglected to include a viewing of The Prince of Egypt, which I haven't seen. I may check it out. What do you think? I hope you enjoyed these resources ideas.

I wonder if the 6th grade will be visiting The Metropolitan Museum of Art, as my kids' grade did?

The Sea Spicer