lesson_ancient_map

=Names:= Alexis Cabrera Margarita Estevez Naika Rodriguez

Standards:

 * **New York State** – 3. 1c, 3. 2a: Students will use a variety of intellectual skills to demonstrate their understanding of the geography of the interdependent world in which we live—local, national, and global—including the distribution of people, places, and environments over the Earth’s surface.
 * **National Geography Standards** – 3,E Locate places within the local community, State, and nation; locate the Earth's continents in relation to each other and to principal parallels and meridians.
 * **New York City** - Hemispheres, continents and countries can be located on world maps and globes 3.1b, 3.1c, 3.2a

This lesson plan provide an opportunity for students to brainstorm why an ancient map would make a lot of money or why not if it was to be sell. Eventually it would not make that much money because it illustrates only three continents and the actual global map shows that there are seven continents. By looking at the comparison of both maps, students will be able to understand that the Earth is divided into seven continents. Once this part of the lesson is accomplished, then we can proceed to teach the lesson starting with a definition of the word continent, which it is defined as one of several large landmasses on the Earth. .
 * Summary:**


 * APA Citation:**
 * 1) Duea,J. (1985). Maps and Globes:An Instructional Unit for Elementary Grades. University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, Iowa 50613. (ERIC Document Reproduction Service No. ED 292 691). – The document consists on improving the students' ability to read and interpret maps and globes. In the lesson the students must locate, acquire, organize, interpret, evaluate, and express knowledge and information. This lesson would be easy to integrate into our lesson plan because it would help us explain how to read and interpret all kinds of maps and globes, which will help the students differentiate between old and new world maps.
 * 2) Ronkowski, S. and Winget, P. (1988). Integrating the Core Curriculum Through Cooperative Learning: Exploring the Continents. 650 University Ave., Room 201, Sacramento, California 95825. (ERIC Document Service No. ED 300 975) – The document contains a lesson plan called "__Exploring the Continents,__" and in the lesson the students will form into six groups and will explore the characteristics of each continent; except Antartica which can be used as an example. This lesson will be integrated into our lesson when the students have to compare the continents from the old maps to the continents that appeared later on. Having a better knowledge of the continents will make our lesson richer.


 * Lesson Plans:**

These lesson plans are related to the aim presented below. The main themes of each one are about continents, their size, physical features, location, among many other information, which make them relevant to our lesson plan. In addition, these lesson plans are designed for the same grade as the one we have been working on, which is 3rd grade. Even though there are some lesson plans that can be used on grades ranking from 3rd to 8th, there are also some advances on that. For example, if the lesson is to go on for more than one session, these lesson plans provided different activities at different levels (fundamental info. to more advance), facilitating the teacher's work, and allowing more time to enjoy the development of the lesson with her students.
 * 1) Comparing the Continents Xpeditions Lesson Plan – In this lesson, the students will examine maps and globes to compare the physical features of Earth's continents. They will play the GeoSpy continents game and manipulate an online map to compare the continents' climates. Students will conclude by writing paragraphs comparing and contrasting two continents.
 * 2) Creating the Continents HotChalk Lesson Plan – In this lesson, the students will learn about the seven continents and where they are in relation to one another. A balloon is going to be used for learning the location of each continent by creating your own world globe. The students will be split into seven different groups after making your balloons and they can share them with your group.
 * 3) [|The Continent Game HotChalk Lesson Plan>] – In this lesson, the students review the continents. As they name them, write them on the board in alphabetical order. The students identify the rule that is used to order the continents. Then, the students answer if there are other possible ways to order the continents and write suggestions on the board.
 * 4) [|Exploring the World's Geography Discovery Lesson Plan] – In this lesson, the students will make a papier-mâché globe of Earth's continents, identify the prominent physical features of each continent, and compare the geography of each continent.
 * 5) [|The Continent Game Educator's Reference Desk Lesson Plan] – In this lesson plan, the students will correctly order the continents in terms of area, population, and other geographic terms. Students will receive a list of data for each continent. They will have to draw conclusions from the list based on area, population, population density, and annual growth.
 * 6) [|Where in the World? NEA Lesson Plan] – In this lesson plan, the students will develop research skills, as well as map and geography skills, and learn about important places in the world and world history by locating different places in the world. They will receive a Where in the World? work sheet. Students will create their won Where in the World? questions. We will compile the ten best questions into a new work sheet. This will help students exercise their research skills.

The six lesson plans listed above present the same concept of identifying the continents, finding the characteristics of each continent, comparing and contrasting the continents with each other, and some other things. The lesson plans are very similar, so the only way that they each could help our own lesson is by giving us ideas on how to make more follow up activities that are different and creative. We will use each of these lesson plans so that we can get more ideas on how to expose the concept of "continents."

__**Online Collaborative Writing Assignment**__


 * Group Definition of Blogs:**

A website that is continuously updated and allows users to reflect, share opinions, discuss various topics in the form of an online journal.

Example #1: Christina's Classroom Example #2: Mr. Glichrist's Social Studies Blog Example #3: Hickam Elementary School Blog


 * Group Definition of Wikis:**

A website with various information that allows users to easily edit the information. (kind of like an on line encyclopedia)

Example #1: http://woodward8.wikispaces.com/ Example #2: http://www.wikipedia.org/ Example #3: Mrs. Howard's 7th Grade Social Studies Wiki


 * How could Wikis and/or Weblogs be used in your lesson plan?**

Since Wikis or Weblogs are good platforms for sharing different learning activities, they could be implemented in this lesson plan as a follow up activity. This means that it could be use to reinforce what the students would learn through this lesson plan. An example could be, divide the class on groups and assign them an activity where they would have to arrange the continents by size, and probably by any other feature, also they would have to explain some differences and similarities among the continents. This kind of activity fosters team work among the students at the same time that reinforces their knowledge. Also it would allows the teacher to check periodically on her students work.


 * Lesson Plan**




 * Test Questions**


 * Edublogs:**

__http://nyceducator.com/2009/11/have-drink-lose-your-job.html__

[|Have a Drink, Lose Your Job]
==== Ms. Payne, a teacher in Georgia has been fired, the reason being because of her facebook account. She had a few pictures of herself holding an alcoholic beverage and used foul language on her page. Some parents complained and feared that it might be influencial on their children. Ms. Payne is now suing her school district. ====

__http://timfredrick.typepad.com/timfredrick/2007/08/motivation-is-n.html__


 * Tim Fredrick's ELA Teaching Blog**

__Motivation is not the problem__
A new program will be put into some NYC schools which feels that’s the problem in the school has to do with motivation. There answer to this problem is more money. The students with the higher grades will get paid money. Sounds great huh? but the author doesn’t agree. He states that money wont get the job done and that the will to learn should come from within the learners and the teachers. Rewards will not make anything better.

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