Fieldwork Jounal 5: Building Blocks of Mapping

Turns out there are many steps to teaching 10-year-olds to make a scaled map of their classroom. After teaching two seperate sessions of the lessons, I recommend that students:

• Consider the room
• Orient to cardinal directions
• Determine unit of measurement (non-standard in this case)
• Gather Data (length &width of room, longitude and latitude objects)

THEN begin plotting the data on a piece of graph paper. Translating data to paper as you collect it simply won't do for 10-year-olds. We actually didn't get to plotting the data on graph paper at all this week. One thing at a time.

But students had lots of fun choosing non-standard units of measurement. My favorites included: a trashcan, an injured students crutches, the class sugar glider* (students were encouraged to use a stuffed animal sugar glider, and not that actual animal).

*This is what a sugar glider baby looks like:

This is what they can do when they grow up.