Melanie asked me if I would write an update on the geography curriculum I have been using on our co-schooling days with the middle school kids.
That would be, Mapping the World with Art by Ellen J. McHenry. It's a combined history, art, and geography program that walks you through the history of cartography while kids learn, progressively, to draw maps of the world and produce a series of geographical art projects. There are a couple of games, too, and the whole thing culminates in a project of creating a large, attractive world map (or even drawing a world map from memory, if that is more your thing).
I have posted some pictures here and there over the last year and a half.
Since we meet with our co-schooling partners two days a week, and since the book is comprehensive with lots of activities, H and I decided to spend two school years on it. The kids were in 3rd-6th grades when we started and now are in 4th-7th (with the oldest kids having also taken on an additional history curriculum this school year).
Melanie asked me,
How did you like the book as it progressed? Did you finish it or will you finish? What have you liked and disliked about it? I'm seriously thinking of adding it to my slate for next year, but wanted a later term review.
I answered,
1. I still love it. It is one of the most successful curricula I have ever bought. I needed something that would challenge and interest a mixed-age group of middle schoolers, including one poor reader and one who had never been interested in history read-alouds.
2. We aren't done yet. I decided to spread the curriculum over 2 years at 2 one-hour sessions a week. I think you could finish it in a year if you planned ahead and did it daily, and under those circumstances it would "count" for all your social studies, art, and considerable copywork (because of all the map labeling). But I have to say the pacing seems just right at twice a week.
3. I have barely changed anything. A few activities, we have skipped. I went through the book ahead of time and figured out what we would do and not do.
4. Best: it engaged a mixed group, 2nd through 6th graders, and is definitely multisensory (both DVD and text instructions are included; I make the kids watch the DVD and give them the text to refer to while they draw.) Drawback - required a fair amount of materials and prep. I made a chart ahead of time listing the lessons I'd do in order and the needed materials, and I bought every art material I would need for 4 kids for the whole 2 yrs at once and stored it in a big labeled tub, pencils and dice and tagboard and paint and all. But once I had done that (and you know I like to pre-plan rather than last-minute scramble) the weekly prep was pretty simple.
Today's work was to draw a complete North America using the Mercator projection, having drawn one last tine with a conical projection.
They saved time by using a worksheet with the southern part of the continent already outlined, since what they need to see is the difference that the projection makes in the northern part. In the above picture, the top left drawing was done by a fourth-grader, the bottom right by a seventh-grader, and the others are of kids whose ages fall between that.
Highly recommended still.
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