Category: History: Geography Activities

Let’s Learn about the World 2

Let’s Learn about the World

When we start back into our school year LD and DD are going to learn some basic facts about the world in which we live — the largest continent-Asia the largest country-Russia the largest ocean-Pacific the largest desert-Sahara the tallest mountain-Mt. Everest the longest river-the Nile has been long thought to be the longest river, but an expedition in 2000 found the Amazon River to be 64 miles longer. world...

This is the United States–Unit Study 0

This is the United States–Unit Study

American  Landmarks, Symbols, Basic Facts We are going to study some basic facts and symbols of the United States with this unit study.  Things like US geography (rivers, mountains, time zones) famous landmarks American patriotic songs the US flag the Liberty Bell the Statue of Liberty, the Great Seal etc. etc. Here are the topics we’ll be covering over a two or three week period (or so) in this introduction...

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World Music Class: Games and Music of Mexico and South America

Since my kids are learning a bit about the Mayans, Aztecs and Incas we decided to jump to South America with our world music class.  We are enjoying music, geography and games from Mexico and South America. Here’s what we’re covered with our friends the past couple of weeks: *We all sing hello and each child chooses a movement for the rest of the group to follow. *I pull out...

Geography: Europe board game 10

Geography: Europe board game

We’ve done a lot with geography of Europe this semester. That’s in part because three of our unit studies have focused on Europe — our world music class, the Middle Ages unit and our fairy tale unit.  I ordered this game back in February, but with the flu and pneumonia descending upon us we never got to it.  We’ve had a blast with it the past week or so. Here’s...

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World Music : Europe

For the first time in months, we had our music classes. We took a long break because of the holidays, sickness and house problems. It was so wonderful to catch up with our friends again.  We are continuing on with our studies of Europe and the music of Europe.  First, we reviewed the seven continents (to the tune of Frere Jacques). Europe, Asia, A-fri-caa, North America South America Then there...

Europe Pin Map 6

How to Make a Pin Map of Europe

We are heading off to Europe in our world music class this week and to get ready for that, I made a pin map of Europe.  I’ll explain how I made mine in case someone else finds it useful. Step 1: I printed off a blank map of Europe from freeusandworldmaps.com.  I also printed off the labeled Europe map from that same website as a control. I laminated these two...

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Japan: Geography, Music and Culture Unit (PreK; Grade 2)

The theme of our music class these next two or three weeks is Japan.  Each week we sang the continent song together.  This week, we pulled out a new kind of map, a Montessori flag map.  We learned where Japan was located and placed the flags we knew on the map.  Then everybody piled outside to do a scavenger hunt for Japanese flags. (from Japanese Flag printables) We then looked...

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Australia — Music and Culture

In our music class we are covering music from different places around the world.  Easiest for me was starting with some music from Australia!  I talked more about this in another post below.  One of the outside activities everyone did this past week was to make their own dot painting. The picture on the left is a dot painting that we bought in central Australia about 10 years ago.  It...

Geography 0

Geography

This week reviewed the seven continents (and sang the continent song).  We used a different map than the one pictured here and moved magnetic continents to the correct place on the map.  DD asks again and again, “Do we live in America now?” Even little ED has asked, “Is this home?  Daddy home? LD home?  Boomer (the dog) home?” and through the entire family.  Change is hard, I think.  ...

Country Box Exchange: Singapore 12

Country Box Exchange: Singapore

We did a country box exchange with a family who livesin Singapore. The kids were SO excited by all of thegoodies. We rushed to the map to locate Singapore,then tried playing the kids games, looked through thebrochures and postcards. We’ve done this with several families, but wewere “burned” by a family in Ireland who exchangedaddresses, but never sent anyone in our exchangegroup a reciprical package. Seems a shame and youwonder...

World Biomes Pin Map and Pieces — Download Available 0

World Biomes Pin Map and Pieces — Download Available

This post is best viewed here. I’ve added pictures and updated this post!! World Biomes Pin Map – Rain Forest, Desert, Savanna, Tundra and More I obtained permission to use the world biomes map and legend that I used to create our pin map. I went ahead and made downloadable pages for you to use. It is three pages long. The first page is the World Biomes Map and Legend,...

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Rain Forest Plants Activity

Today I gathered up the various foods and spices that go along with the rain forest plant cards. The kids were intrigued and excited (“we get to TRY everything, right?!!”) To introduce the rain forests, we first did our world pin map (bottom right) and sang our continent song. Then we pulled out the biome pin map, placed the deciduous and coniferous forests (that we studied last week) and then...

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Ancient Greece — Geography Project (part 1)

This project idea was adapted from Ancient Greece!: 40 Hands-On Activities to Experience This Wondrous Age (Kaleidoscope Kids Books). (affiliate link) We bought some self-hardening clay and looked at various maps to make a map of Greece with its many islands. Obviously Mom had a hand in forming the mainland areas of Greece and Asia Minor (now Turkey). The kids did all of the islands. We’ve been reading Mary Pope...