Egypt’s Bibliotheca Alexandrina has organised training courses to teach hieroglyphs to Grade 4 elementary school social studies teachers.
The move comes as part of cooperation between the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, represented by the Calligraphy Studies Center in the Academic Research Sector, and the Directorate of Education in Alexandria, represented by the General Administration of General Education – School Resources Development.
These courses mainly aim to provide elementary school social studies teachers with scientific development in the two fields of the Ancient Egyptian language.
It also aims to help them get acquainted with the latest scientific theories that contribute to supporting the educational process, and to raise the academic and intellectual level of students.
This comes in line with Egypt’s Vision 2030 for pre-university education, which was established to nurture the gifted and provide them with higher quality education of advanced knowledge and skills. At the same time, it aims to encourage school students to undertake research.
The courses are designed to support the understanding of Egypt’s ancient civilisation, and to learn the basic principles of deciphering the Ancient Egyptian language. It helps participants study basic sentences and rules, such as simple hieroglyphs, reading the names of kings and nobles, and learning basic grammatical constructs on which the Ancient Egyptian language is based.
Earlier, Egypt’s Ministry of Education and Technical Education announced that hieroglyphics will be taught as part of the new school curricula in the academic year.
The new curriculum will pay special attention to archaeology and tourism, starting with kindergarten up to Grade 3 of elementary school. Meanwhile, hieroglyph symbols will be taught starting from Grade 4.
In February, Minister of Tourism and Antiquities Khaled El-Anani said that he had met with Minister of Education and Technical Education Tarek Shawky to discuss introducing archaeological and touristic material to the curriculum. This would take place to help foster an awareness of Egypt’s ancient history among upcoming generations.
