Where All Started (Reflection#7)

When I think about education, I see a tree. The culture and believes are the base or the roots of the tree because the place where people are educated has a strong influence in their education. Secondly, the trunk of the tree would be the historic period because time is another factor that influences in education and the available learning resources to students. Finally, the branches of the tree would be the different teaching ways among a same cultural surrounding. In the case of ancient civilizations like Egypt and Mesopotamia, the branches of the tree would be homeschooling, apprenticeship, and temple education. Homeschooling, which was the first and simplest teaching method in the child's life, refers to education at home where children learned from their parents and elder people only by observation, listening, and imitation. This is why some people say that "home is the first school". In Egypt, children used to learn about tradition, how to behave in society, their ancestors' religion, and even their future profession because occupations were considered hereditary. For instance, a farmer had to teach his son how to be a good farmer, and an artisan had to teach his son how to do pottery. Those men who could not have a direct descendent could adopt a son, but only with the condition to educate him in their labor. It is pretty obvious to me how important was for the Egyptian to follow the tradition. The only one who did not teach his sons directly was the king. The girls were also instructed at home. They learned to do households, sing, dance, and in some cases, play a music instrument. In Mesopotamian civilization, the education of values and tradition by the family was similar to the one in Egypt. A more formal approach to education was apprenticeship which was like in a job training nowadays. The method like today consisted in observing the task, practicing it under supervision, and mastering the abilities. Memorization was a main key on the apprenticeship method to educate. Masters not only trained about crafts but also medicine, architecture, sculpture, and several others. During the time they were learning, apprentices lived in the house of their masters who had to support them like a son. In ancient Mesopotamia apprentices were so important that apprenticeship was included in a code of laws called the Code of Hammurabi. Besides their future profession, apprentices sometimes learned writing, and arithmetic. When the time came to prove their abilities, apprentices became journeymen. Apprentices in Egypt enjoy a great consideration and esteem, and learning an occupation was seen as a life changing process that revealed the Truth. The other type of education was the temple education. This way was more sophisticated than the others because students took lessons in a classroom with a scribe or priest as a teacher. Most of the students who graduated from a temple school ended as priests, or they became temple or royal scribes. In ancient Mesopotamian and Egypt the formal education in temples was about the same where the students learned about medicine, astrology and laws in addition to basic subjects like writing, reading and math. Temples' classrooms can be considered as the first academic schools. Finally, despite the fact that education in Egypt and Mesopotamia was diverse, there is no doubt that these first innovative methods of teaching served as the base for the existence of modern schools.