Earlier this week, Year 3 had the wonderful opportunity to visit the Tutankhamun Immersive Experience at London Excel in East London, an amazing exhibition which enabled the children to immerse themselves in the world of Ancient Egypt through digital technology.
The Elizabeth Line made this an extremely convenient location and a very smooth journey from Bond Street to Custom House. Once we arrived, we found a safe place to leave our lunches and go to the toilet before we were introduced to our guide who led us through the experience from start to finish. Our first stop was a gallery with lots of amazing artefacts, both primary and secondary, from Tutankhamun’s tomb which was a great way to bring bring the history of Ancient Egypt to life.
The next stop on our journey was the immersive hall, where a 360 degree projection onto 8 metre high canvases of moving images of Ancient Egypt helped us feel like we were on a journey through time. The movie also told the story of one of the greatest archeological discoveries in history, Howard Carter’s discovery of Tutankhamun himself!
The next room we visited was a Virtual Reality room where each of were given headsets to embark on a seated virtual reality journey through the Egyptian afterlife, the Valley of the Kings and Howard Carter’s monumental discovery. This was incredibly fun and the next room on our journey was just as amazing – it was the mummification holographic presentation. The ritual and procedure of mummification was brought to life in front of our eyes and we felt like we were there thousands of years ago in the room witnessing the ritual.
We finished our journey with another virtual reality experience of Ancient Egypt but this time we could walk around and explore our virtual surroundings. Amazingly we could see each other within the context of this other world but only in the image of Howard Carter (this was to make sure we didn’t bump into each other as we walked around).
It was a shame to leave but our journey lasted 2 hours, which was the perfect amount of time to appreciate all the wonderfully innovative experiences the exhibition had to offer. After we had gathered our belongings we had lunch on the river front because it was such a beautiful day! Thank you so much to all the parent volunteers who accompanied us on this trip. I would highly recommend this experience to anyone who is quick enough to catch it before it finishes at the end of this month!
