reflection 9

The article “the first schools” and “ancient egyptian education” speak about the forms of education in these two different locations. Even though they have many differences , they also have much in comparison. One thing in common that stood out to me was the fact that the wealthier people were the ones with the best education and the people with less wealth got poorer or even no education. In the summerian schools, you had to pay for school. This payed the salaries of the “staff”. This made school something the poor could not afford. In ancient egyptian education, the less wealthy got less formal education. For example, the fishermens children learned how to sow, harvest, and tend poultry and cattle. The egyptians received their education by heredity. You learned the skills that your parents proffessions required, therfore giving you a sure success in that field. Both the sumerians and the egyptians spoke very little about female education. In the summerian schools there is no listing of women as scribes. The women in ancient egypt were taught how to manage a household, sing, dance, and play instruments. In their different ways, both had the goal of preparing the student with sufficient skills for what was to be their proffession, which ever it was. I believe that the effectiveness of the teacher was a bit stronger before than now. They used their discipline untill the task was done right and I think that put more pressure on the student to get it right. Today, the discipline isnt as strong and that pressure is no longer their. The teacher is not as intimidating to the student as before, and the consequences arent as immediate and physical for the student of today. Therefore, I think the effect of the teacher to the student was seen a lot faster than it is today.

reflection #7

The ancient civilizations had three ways of learning and teaching. Homeschooling, apprenticeship, and temple education. Just like in society today, education was extremely important. Education was and still is a way to move up in society, show and gain respect, and just overall better yourself. Education gave you better options in life, just as it does today. As time went by, more ways of learning became available. As inventions came to hand, they brought about more things to learn and be taught. As different jobs were created, the skills became something that had to be learned. These are the ways that the people of ancient civilizations acquired their knowledge. First of all was homeschooling. With homeschooling, parents taught their children what they believed and knew. Religious beliefs and practical skills were passed down to kids during homeschooling. Children were taught how to treat other people and what was right from wrong. They were taught how to behave around certain people. every family followed this tradition except the king. The king did not tutor his kids himself. This homeschooling system is still around today and will forever exist between parents and their offspring. As a mother/father, you want your children to succeed in life. The second form of education used in ancient times was apprenticeship. Apprenticeship is somewhat similar to homeschooling only it’s a step higher. The word apprentice means to learn, and this is exactly what was done during an apprenticeship. They used to form what they called guilds, which were craftsmen who specialized in manufacturing a certain good. A guild consisted of journeymen, apprentices and a master. This master had all the power being the only one capable of assigning certain men to different jobs or even hiring them. An apprentice was like an “adopted son” to a guild. Usually an apprentice was around the age of ten or twelve and was required to live with the master. It was a real honor to be an apprentice because it assured position and respect in life. Things like architecture, sculpture, and medicine were learned through these almost ten year apprenticeships. A third approach the ancient civilizations took to learning was by temple education. In temple schools children were taught the difficult cuneiform, arithmetic, and standard measures. Through this we gained many important things like the word dozen and the division of the clock. Each and every form of learning they used was of a great significance and has let us aquire the magnitude of learning that we do today.

reflection #6

Writing is such an important way of comunication. It brought about a way to preserve more complex ideas. Instead of relying on memory and story telling, writing allowed stories, thoughts, and ideas to be kept for longer periods of time. Writing allows us to keep records of important events and thoughts. When writing was invented it took communication to a whole other level. We were now able to transfer our thoughts onto surfaces. This allowed information to be shared in a different way than verbally or physically (through body language). Instead of simply relying on sound, now ideas could be transferred with images and symbols representing these sounds. These symbols representing sounds later, and slowly, became what we know now as the alphabet. It all began with images representing entire stories or scenarios, then representing a single thought or idea, and later each symbol represented a sound. At times, these symbols were used for one two or even three different meanings until they finally assigned each symbol to a sound or vowel. The entire alphabet is made up of “symbols” that represent sounds. These symbols/sounds put together make up the words that we now use in our everyday languages. The fact that now thoughts could be written down gave the ancient civilizations such a huge advantage. Writing became crucial to the civilizations because now they could keep track of things and emit across an idea to their entire population. With writing they could now keep track of the amount of resources they had, and how much each person was entitled to. They could now expose their cultivating skills by making images of the cultivating process. Aswell as keeping track of things like grain and beer, writing helped the ancient civilizations to count their belongins. Now they could claim things like their property, and animals. Writing allowed the establishment of rules and regulations for the members of each civilization to follow. Writing also allowed civilizations to communicate with eachother. The invention of writing allowed civilizations to grow bigger and stronger. If it werent for the images and symbols used by these ancient civilizations, we would not know the things we know about them today. Just like many years from now people will know about our different cultures because of the writings that we leave behind. With writing we can leave a mark in history.

reflection #4

Reading these essays has made me think about human evolution more than I have ever before. I learned that there are still many unanswered questions and doubts about the human evolution. I learned that there were many different stages to the human before we got to what we look like now. As the years passed, the human evolved into a much bigger species. The newer findings are much taller, have way bigger brain sizes, and the jaws and teeth are bigger as well. For instance, “lucy” was only about 3 feet 8 inches. Very small compared to a female of today. As the human developed, the body grew bigger and more upright, less and less like an ape. I think the most important thing I learned from these readings is that the process of us getting to what we are now took many years. As they find more and older forms of the human, I realize that the changes were small. Little by little the human changed very slightly like in the way he stood, the shape of its jaw, the size of its teeth and the length of the arms or legs. I believe that these findings are taking us closer and closer to the base of the tree. Many people disagree with the fact that the first humans came about in Africa, but these readings make it pretty clear that they did. These readings have affected my beliefs in a large way. Not only these readings, but also everything I have been taught in school about the human evolution. As I grew up I was taught that adam and eve were put on earth and this is where us humans came from. It always seemed very fictional to me that this could be the way the entire human population came about. Also, my parents never supported the idea of humans evolving from apes. The scientific explanations to human evolution are far more credible to me. I would rather base my beliefs on actual facts. I now have a stronger belief in the fact that we evolved from the chimp family. There is just so much that we have in common with them from physical aspects, to the way that we use tools. I am amazed that the human species has evolved so much and only makes me think that we will continue to do so. I believe that the human will forever evolve. Millions of years from now we will not look or carry ourselves in the way that we do today and that’s just the way things are. Change is part of our lives and I believe it is necessary in order to adapt to the world around us.