Introducing Quikmaps
A number of online mapping programmes come with simple tools that allow you to adapt the original and create your own personalised map - which in effect is a very simple Geographical Information System or GIS.
The programme I'm going to feature in this activity is called Quikmaps. This programme enables you to add symbols, text-boxes and lines to a Google Map and is pretty simple to use.
The following guide will be very useful to those of you who do not know Quikmaps.
Download: A Guide to Using Quikmaps
Using Quikmaps to explore the local area
In the Year 5 class where I recently worked we have concentrated on exploring the children's local area. Have a look at this Quikmap that was created by a Year 5 class from a school in Wakefield.
I chose the satellite photo view and we began by identifying features that pupils recognised. I didn't expect them to be able to locate named places (though some of the children could) as I was more interested in whether they could identify features, e.g. roads, houses, railway etc. They then had to tell their talking partner what they could see and to make a note of it in their notebook. Using this strategy I was able to keep all the children actively thinking. I took feedback from each table in turn. The Interactive White Board (IWB) was a useful tool that enabled me to display the aerial photo at a large scale. The children loved being able to zoom into their local area and to explore areas immediately adjacent to the school. Note: This programme is not the same as Google Earth which enables you to take a flight around the globe.
Two examples of emotional mapping in action
One of the key ideas in this unit is that of 'emotional mapping', but this is not just something that happens in the classroom. Let us now look at two examples where community groups have used a similar idea to map their 'feelings' about their local areas.
|
Sharrow Songlines Here, a community group in Sheffield has used the idea of emotional mapping to share their feelings about their own locality in a similar way to the Y5 children. I think the Y5 children have been more creative with their use of symbols though. What do you think? |
 |
|
Find a story, Map a story, Tell a story... This is an interesting Canadian contribution where people tell their stories about the neighbourhood in which they live and in many cases have grown up. It takes the idea of emotional mapping one step further into the realm of story linked to places. |
 |
How will you use Quikmaps?
Decide how you will use Quikmaps with children. Take a closer look at the two examples offered above and make notes about how you might use these ideas with your class.
What makes this geography?
A key geographical idea is that our identity and place are inextricably linked - that the people we are and become have been shaped by our early experiences of the place in which we grew up.
'Place identity and attachment we argue contribute to a person's sense of personal identity, and this must be particularly important in the middle years of childhood. Many of the pioneer studies of how children use their neighbourhoods have stressed this link...'
Christopher Spencer, Place and Identity: the view from environmental psychology
Make your own
Why not create your own 'feelings' map or story map of a place that is familiar to you? What does this allow you to show that conventional maps do not? Try this activity with your class. We organised it so that three pupils took control of the Quikmaps page and invited other members of the class to come and add their own information, one pupil at a time.
Course Menu
Comment on this page
Comments made by GA members appear instantly - make sure you're logged in! Guest comments will be sent to a moderator for approval.
Current conversations
What our website visitors are talking about.