Map skills are so fun to teach in the primary grades! One of the skills that we work on in our first grade map unit is identifying the 7 continents and 5 oceans. I broke this Social Studies lesson into two days. On the first day we learned about the land/continents and on the second day we learned about the water/oceans. My students loved learning about the great, big world we live in and this 2-day lesson was a fun, hands-on way to teach the basic geography of our world!
On the 1st day I told students that we were going to go on a field trip all around the world! You should have heard the kids' excitement! I told them that a special tour guide was coming to take us on our trip and pulled out the book "Swift Walker - A Continental Journey: Geography Books for Kids! (Volume 1)."
Books are the best way to travel to places if you can't make the actual trip! As we "traveled" with Swift Walker to each continent we all stood up and walked in place. When we arrived at a new continent we paused to locate it and label it on a Color Your Own World Map Poster on the board.
After "traveling" (aka reading) to all of the 7 continents we played the game "Find that Continent!" I have learned that if you turn even a simple task into a game, it is so much more engaging! We used the Plush Label Me Globe to play the game.
The student who had the globe would say another student's name, pass the globe to him or her, and the student who caught the Plush Label Me Globe would look to see what continent their hand landed on. The student then had to come and find the continent on our class map. The students loved this part!
To practice and apply their knowledge of the 7 continents, students each got their own Color Your Own World Map Poster to label and color the continents. Students were elated to do these large posters! To make it even more fun, I gave each student an Earth Pencil with Globe Eraser to use so they could write the names of the continents. I told my students that we were going to get to take another field trip with Swift Walker to all of the oceans the next day and they couldn't wait!
On the 2nd day, we followed the same routine as the first day for the lesson, but instead focused on the 5 oceans! We "traveled" to the 5 oceans by reading the book "Swift Walker: A Journey Around the Oceans: Science and Geography Books for Kids (Volume 2)."
We walked with Swift to each ocean and when a new ocean was identified in the story, I labeled it on the same Color Your Own World Map Poster that we used for the continents the day before. We also played the "Find that Ocean!" game by rolling the Plush Label Me Globe to a student who came and found the ocean that her hand landed on.
After "traveling" to all 5 oceans, the students finished their Color Your Own World Map Posters from the first day by labeling and coloring the 5 oceans.
The students did such a great job on their maps that we hung them out in the hallway to showcase our new map skills. We had so much fun "traveling" around the world together to learn about the continents and the oceans!
