ALEX Resources

Title: Tech Tours using Google Earth-it’s easy, it’s fun…come take a trip with us!
Description: Grab your passport and head around the world as K-2 students become reporters using Google Earth and podcasting to learn and share about maps, globes, people and places around the community, state and world. Tools featured include: Tablet pc’s, iPods, digital cameras, document camera, classroom response system, and free web 2.0 tools.
Standard(s):
[SS2010] LWT2 (2) 6: Identify states, continents, oceans, and the equator using maps, globes, and technology.

Title: Fifty States Project
Description: Students will follow simple research steps in the school media center and on the Internet to complete a poster on an assigned state by identifying the state's symbols and agricultural products.
Standard(s):
[SS2010] LWT2 (2) 10: Identify ways people throughout the country are affected by their human and physical environments.

Title: Explore Your State with Maps
Description: In this Xpeditions lesson, students create maps of their state using information from National Geographic's MapMachine. They then make their own maps from memory after studying the original maps they created. The lesson concludes with a discussion of the benefits of understanding your state map and remembering certain key features of the state's geography.
Standard(s):
[SS2010] LWT2 (2) 6: Identify states, continents, oceans, and the equator using maps, globes, and technology.

Title: Using Maps to See Regions
Description: In this Xpeditions lesson, students travel around the world on a visual scavenger hunt. They select a handful of important natural and cultural characteristics of places. They then search through magazines such as National Geographic for photographs that illustrate the range of those characteristics. They also chart the locations they find on a map of the world.
Standard(s):
[SS2010] LWT2 (2) 6: Identify states, continents, oceans, and the equator using maps, globes, and technology.

Title: Stars and Stripes Forever: Flag Facts for Flag Day
Description: In this unit of three lessons, from EDSITEment, students learn what a symbol is while developing their understanding of how one particular symbol, the American Flag, plays an important role in the everyday lives of American citizens. Learning the history of the flag helps instill in students respect for our national symbol and helps them learn appropriate etiquette regarding our flag. Students learn that other symbols of our country, such as the President and certain holidays, like Flag Day, are important to us as well. Students can also contribute symbols from their familial, ethnic and national cultures to show the diversity of American society and its links to other parts of the world.
Standard(s):
[SS2010] LWT2 (2) 5: Differentiate between a physical map and a political map.

Title: Mapping Our Worlds
Description: In this lesson, from EDSITEment, students explore the world of maps and learn how to view the world around them in a two-dimensional format. They begin by depicting the familiar terrain of their favorite rooms. In order to understand the concept of boundaries, they then create maps of areas within their classroom. To reinforce the relationship of small to large and the concept of one area nesting within another, students then compare a series of online geographical maps, beginning with a map of their home state and ending with a map of the world. Finally, students may extend what they have learned by creating maps of other parts of their immediate environments, such as routes that they regularly travel.
Standard(s):
[SS2010] LWT2 (2) 6: Identify states, continents, oceans, and the equator using maps, globes, and technology.

Title: 'Adopt'' a Geographic News Story
Description: In this lesson, from Xpeditions, students are introduced to some stories from National Geographic News and then invited to discuss the reasons why it is a good idea to follow the news. The class adopts a geographic news story, designs posters to illustrate it, and researches related topics.
Standard(s):
[SS2010] LWT2 (2) 10: Identify ways people throughout the country are affected by their human and physical environments.

Title: Spice World
Description: In this Xpeditions student activity, students create a map showing the origins of the spices and herbs that help flavor their favorite dishes. Related activities for parents to do with their children are also found on this page.
Standard(s):
[SS2010] LWT2 (2) 6: Identify states, continents, oceans, and the equator using maps, globes, and technology.

Title: City or Country Life?
Description: In this Xpeditions lesson, students explore the advantages and challenges of life in urban and rural areas. The focus is on cities and villages in Eastern Asia.
Standard(s):
[SS2010] GHS (3) 4: Relate population dispersion to geographic, economic, and historic changes in Alabama and the world. (Alabama)

Title: Great Websites for Kids
Description: Created by the American Library Association, this portal website helps parents and children find age appropriate educational materials on the Internet.
Standard(s):
[SS2010] WH8 (8) 16: Describe major cultural changes in Western Europe in the High Middle Ages (1000-1300 A.D.).

Title: Spice World
Description: In this Xpeditions student activity, students create a map showing the origins of the spices and herbs that help flavor their favorite dishes. Related activities for parents to do with their children are also found on this page.
Standard(s):
[SS2010] LWT2 (2) 6: Identify states, continents, oceans, and the equator using maps, globes, and technology.