Neighborhood Maps Spark Discussions Of Community

(This dovetails nicely with Slice of Life)
Map Collage1

My students were working on maps of their own neighborhoods, as part of the National Day on Writing yesterday. We were using mapping as a way to think about community, about how mapmakers focus on what is important and what is not so important by using color and scale. And as students shared out their maps (with our classroom and then, online, with the #6Connect project), the discussions of neighborhoods transformed into discussions about community (with a little help from me).

map collage2

I love the idea of visually representing a place, and my students enjoyed thinking of how to represent their neighborhoods as a map as well as providing some insights into where they live on a day when we were writing and thinking about community for the National Day on Writing.

map collage3

Peace (on the map and beyond),
Kevin

4 Comments
  1. What a great way to tie in so many strands of learning. We create maps, too, a la Ralph Fletcher and Marshfield Dreams – but this is just a smarter way to go about it . Thanks!

  2. Love this. What a tangible, real way to start the discussion of community! My 5 year old daughter loves maps (weirdo). You just inspired me to draw one with her!

  3. I’ve had my students do maps of to and from school. Since they live all over the city, it was an ideal way to share what they know of their communities. Love seeing your maps, too.

  4. That looks like so much fun! We are tired of argument and analysis in our classroom (school-wide focus)–time to re-energize writers with the start of our new quarter.

Leave a Reply to Lee Ann Spillane Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *