GLOBAL PERCEPTIONS: HOW YOUR STUDENTS VIEW THE WORLD
Adapted from "Different Perceptions" by Marianne Kenney, NGS, 1986 Summer Institute

OVERVIEW:

This lesson shows how perceptions influence peoples’ mental maps of the world and their attitudes about places. This activity asks students to examine their mental maps of the world by "tearing out" and creating one and comparing it with world maps from other cultures and other periods in history. The activity also introduces students to the concept of map projections and to different types of maps.

CONNECTIONS WITH THE CURRICULUM: Geography, Social Studies

TEACHING LEVEL: Grades 4-12

CONNECTIONS TO NATIONAL GEOGRAPHY STANDARDS:

2: How to use mental maps to organize information about people, places, and environments in a spatial context.

CONNECTIONS TO OREGON CONTENT STANDARDS:

Read, interpret, and make maps, charts, and graphs to understand spatial and geographic relationships.

MATERIALS:

Large sheets of colored butcher paper and masking tape
Slides or maps of different projections and perspectives of the world
Hand out map projections

PROCEDURE:

  1. Divide the class into groups of four to six students. Assign each group the task of constructing a world map by ripping up pieces of butcher paper in the size and shape of each continent. Give each group a part of the classroom wall or chalkboard to display their world by taping each continent with masking tape.
  2. When all groups have finished, complete their perceptions of the world with maps in the classroom ask these geographic questions:
  1. Have students analyze different map projections of the world as well as world maps from other countries (including those in different languages if possible) and compare these to the maps they have just created.
  2. Have students, individually or in groups, draw a world map that is (choose 1 perspective):