The setting for this time period is Giza, Egypt, along the Nile River during the fourth dynasty of Egypt’s Old Kingdom. The people of this period were ruled by pharaohs. The most famous pharaoh of the fourth dynasty was King Khufu. His tomb, which is known today as The Great Pyramid at Giza, is considered one of the Seven Wonders of the World.

Much of the engineering done in early civilizations, such as ancient Egypt, involved building structures and providing water either for drinking or for irrigation. Irrigation works were a necessity because the population centers were found along the Nile River. The people in these cities needed the water to drink and to grow crops. Both of these engineering applications are presented in the activities in this time period. Students must build one level of a pyramid and create the proper irrigation to grow wheat.
 
Pyramid
Students help build one level of a pyramid designed by King Menkaure (the  randson of King Khufu). Pyramids in ancient Egypt were built stone-by-stone using manual labor. It is believed that ramps were used to haul the stones to the top of the pyramid.

The length of the ramp would determine how steep the ramp would be and how many workers would be needed to haul up the stones. The forces involved with moving a stone up a ramp (friction, weight, pulling) are some of the fundamental principles of civil engineering.
 
Irrigation
Students are put in charge of producing wheat flour that will be used to feed the workers building the pyramids. The main source of water in ancient Egypt was the Nile River. Water had to be diverted from the Nile for both drinking and irrigation. The Egyptians developed a complex set of channels to bring the water from the Nile.

One technique to limit the amount of water flowing into the fields is to use weirs. Weirs are simply objects in the channel that decrease the water flow rate. If the weir height is less than the water level (down), water would flow over them and into the fields. If the weir height were greater than the water height (up), however, then no water would flow into the fields. The amount of water flowing into the field could be controlled by the weir height and the amount of time the weirs were down.