Art & Activities with Ancient Egypt

One social studies topic I loved teaching my 3rd graders was ancient civilizations. Their favorite was always Ancient Egypt.  Obviously, the history of this period was so interesting- pyramids, mummies, pharaohs and hieroglyphics- it sucks kids in!  Sometimes, just sometimes, I like to take the opportunity to bring in some engaging crafts and activities and this unit was always perfect for that. Here are some of my favorite ideas to bring in some fun art and activities with ancient Egypt:

This is something that I did every year with my students and they loved it!  I usually just projected all the hieroglyphs for the alphabet on my white board and everyone drew their own names and decorated however they wished.  Click here for a special freebie that includes the hieroglyphic alphabet and some other fun activities.

These are both fun and easy to make! All you for the cat mummies are paper tubes (toilet paper or paper towel rolls cut in half, some metallic colored paint and a black marker.  Simply squash in the top of your paper tubes to make the ears of the cat.  Then paint the tube with any metallic color paint. After the paint dries you can use a black permanent marker to draw and decorate the cat design for your mummy.

Okay, kids love building things and this is one that everyone will like.  Your students can build pyramids with legos, duplos, blocks, and even geoblocks! Break out those math manipulatives for social studies. :)

You can directed drawing with anything! This directed drawing from Art Projects for Kids is a great addition to your Egyptian unit.  They give directions for how to draw King Tut- perfect for painting or coloring.

Picture via Art Projects for Kids

If you are looking for some reading practice (or test prep- EEK!) you might want to check out my All About Egyptian Mummies non fiction article- FOR FREE!!!.  It comes with an original article, comprehension questions, language editing practice and graphic organizers.