Geography

Geography
There are several geography concepts that are important for students to understand prior to embarking on their first GPS experience. Sending students out with a GPS can be very confusing for students if they have not had the background of how they work and just what is actually happening. Here's a list of ideas that will enhance their first experience with the GPS. Of course, these will vary with the age of the students. While in the classroom, point to the cardinal directions. Then practice the ordinal directions. Post the directions on the classroom walls. Use an atlas or road map and point out the compass rose. Make sure your students understand a grid. Practice using grids then add the grid to Google Earth. In the menu bar look under View and choose Grid. Use a globe or Google Earth to help students understand hemispheres. It is important that they know they live in the western hemisphere and the northern hemisphere. This will help understand the coordinates on the GPS. Practice using the GPS on the playground. Students should concentrate on only one coordinate - either longitude or latitude. Practice walking north and south with the GPS to see how the numbers increase and decrease. Use sidewalk chalk to mark the North Pole and the South Pole just to help them visualize. Once they are confident with longitude have them practice latitude. Point out on a globe that lines of latitude are always parallel. Lines of longitude are an equal distance apart at the equator but eventually they come together at the poles. The Latitude with Attitude Game - use this site to have coordinates generated. Once students become familiar with longitude/latitude and hemispheres, they should determine which continent the given coordinates are in, then try to decide which country. Use Google Earth to pinpoint the location.
 * DIRECTIONS.
 * GRID.
 * HEMISPHERES.
 * LONGITUDE/LATITUDE.
 * Explain that each number reflects location in degrees, minutes, and seconds. For example, one reads "47* 15' 25" as "47 degrees, 15 minutes, and 25 seconds."
 * You can write a coordinate in many different ways to precisely a location on earth. For example, you can write "47* 15' 25" as "47.256944" or "47*15.416666'."
 * Each degree of latitude represents 69 miles, each minute 1.15 miles, and each second 0.02 miles.

Online Resources for Teaching Geography <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">GeoGame: [] <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">Nation Master: [] <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">Wolfram Alpha: [] <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">Weather Wiz Kids: [] <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">Interactive Games on All About World Geography: [] <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">Interactive Games on GeoSpy National Geographic for Kids: [] <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">GeoNet: [] <span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">Geography games: [|http://www.unc.edu/~jmaxim/web_geography_for_kids.htm]

<span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">I really like these books for gathering ideas for using Google Earth and GPS's.