01.25.08

This week in geography, we continued learning some basics about Africa, this week focusing on physical features. The students also learned to play a game called “Marabaraba”, which is a game similar to “Connect Four” or “tic-tac-toe”. Marabaraba is a game from Lesotho, which is a small enclave country within South Africa. Students, if you are reading this, give me the definition of an enclave in a response to this posting and I will give you extra credit!

Next week we will be starting the first of two Africa projects. The first project is called “Exploring Africa”, and the students will be individually creating a  presentation on their chosen African country to share with the class. Look for more information on this project next week!

01.18.08

After a brief look at Oceania, we have moved on and are now studying Africa. We will spend the rest of 3rd quarter learning about Africa, so the next test won’t be for a while yet. Stay tuned for the date as we get closer.

This week the students practiced their scale measurements, as we took the Africa continent map in our atlas and enlarged it 10 times to create a huge wall map for our classroom. The kids each had a country they were assigned to, and they practiced their scale and measurements skills, as well as their creative drawing abilities. We will be piecing together the map next week. I will post a photo of it soon!

We still have another week until we begin the first of two Africa projects. Stay tuned for more information to come!

01.11.08

Welcome back!

We had a great first week of the second semester. The kids came back to school fresh with tales of fun from their time off school, and were ready to go again. This week we focused briefly on Oceania, which is the area of the world that consists of the Pacific Islands, Australia, New Zealand, and Antarctica. It is an area of the world filled with tiny island countries the kids haven’t really heard of before.

We are moving on next week to Africa, where we will spend the next two months. Our first project for third quarter is coming up, so stay tuned for more information!