The first of two lessons on territorial extent of empires in Europe in 814 at the end of Charlemagne’s rule and another after the death of Charlemagne. Students extend and refine their map interpretation skills by examining the use of color to denote territorial ownership. In addition, students make predictions about likely paths of invasion. Key questions: How do physical geography, cultural, economic, and political factors affect borders? To what extent does the physical environment define borders?

This lesson is similar to a "Mystery Skype" where two classes connect through a live video conferencing platform and provide critical thinking clues to determine the location of the other class. Once both locations have been identified, students can then ask additional questions to learn more about the culture, climate, language, and traditions of both classes.

Students will explore the creation, types and uses of maps, the process of map-making and cartography as a career. Students will create a personal map. 

The second of two lessons on Islamic Empires, students examine maps showing the territorial extent of each of the three major Islamic Caliphates. This examination, showing the same territory through different time periods, provides a springboard for analyzing historical factors underlying the territorial changes. Students also explore cultural, economic, and political factors that account for the changing borders as they match explanations associated with the changes in the maps. Key questions: How did the borders of the Islamic Empires change through time? What cultural, economic, and political factors could account for the changing borders?

This resource provides links to a number of activities involving local mapping including autobiographical mapping known as a "turf map," how to get students to connections to their local geographies, mapping a school for teaching tolerance, use of historical maps of a community, and use of technology through Googe Earth. Ideas presented were mostly introduced in APHG Academies that have been sponsored by the VGA, NCGE meetings, AP Annual Conferences, workshops, and through collaboration with colleagues. This collection is intended to help get new teachers started or to move others to grow their curriculum and enhance the experiences of their students and build geographic skills by promoting the inclusion of local geographies into classrooms and through personal observation and data collection in local environments.

Students can explore maps and electronic communication with this hands on map activity. Add an extension to make a classroom quilt map!

This activity supports student knowledge of community and story telling.  Students also build map skills and coding skills as they use the robot to act out the story.  Basic block coding skills can be taught as part of the lesson or prior to the lesson. 

Use pirate maps and treasure to explore basic map concepts – and responsible behaviors associated with using information and technology!

The Big Idea: Kinesthetic learning incorporating programming and language instructionConcept: Programming Bee-Bot while learning school vocabulary and the verb ESTARContext: Students will use the Bee-Bot School Map to talk about the location of various places in the school building and area in Spanish. 

This activity will ask students to locate geographic regions and features on a class map using longitude and latitude measurements. Using the longitude and latitude data, students will be able to visualize geographic features in the actual location in order to analyze the living conditions of various regions.This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 2010256.Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.