Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Map Activities, part 2


Kiddo and I took our street map to the local office supply store and made a set of enlargements. Copiers are good fun for kids, btw.
When we got home I asked Kiddo to find our home on the map, and the day's destination. He did this with ease, not surprisingly, and then he drew the route on the map. He liked this so much he asked for more destinations and drew those routes, too, using different colored pencils.

Three good books we read:
This is Me and Where I Am. This book starts with the world and zooms closer and closer in on a child in his bedroom and then like a camera's wide angle lens, the locations reverse. Although not about maps, per se, I think it helped Kiddo with the concept of maps.

Are We There Yet, Daddy? This book combines 3 of Kiddo's great loves: maps, transportation and numbers. What is really nice about this book is that the map is not just located on the end papers, like a lot of books about travel, but each page has a map insert showing where the boy and his dad are along the route of their journey, and how many miles are left. I have now read this book a gazillion times.

Mapping Penny's World. I would have liked to read this book in conjunction with Map Activities, part 1, but better late than never. An excellent demonstration of how to read maps and especially map keys and symbols.

I would like to read As The Crow Flies, but our library doesn't own it.

3 comments:

  1. I've just started working with CJ about maps, so I'll be looking for the books we haven't read yet. Great idea to blow up a map and have Kiddo find your apartment- I'll have to see if I can come up with a version for our subdivision- or maybe town (?). Have you read Me on the Map by Joan Sweeney? She has a measuring one Kiddo might like too. We also got My Town by Rebecca Treays and really liked it- the book has some interesting flaps that help with placing a building on a larger map.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I requested the Sweeney book from the library, maybe we'll get to pick it up today.... I'll see if we can find the other. Thanks for the tip. I'm thinking google maps might be fun, too. Usually managing Kiddo and the computer is not something I enjoy, however.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Totally agree that kids love maps. When Ben & I did the map of our yard--he loved it!

    Honestly, going in to the activity I didn't really expect much enthusiasm...but, his map was so detailed and he really cared about the project! You can tell by his map:

    http://foursquareschoolhouse.blogspot.com/2009/03/social-studies-mapmaking.html

    ReplyDelete

Feed my comment addiction.

LinkWithin

Related Posts Widget for Blogs by LinkWithin