ELEMENTARY EDUCATION PROGRAM

LESSON PLAN FORMAT

Intern: James Thompson Grade Level: Second Grade
Title: Geography: Measuring Distances in Maps Lesson Plan Date:
12/12/2015
Objectives: Students will describe distances on maps in numerical
sentences and solve using cubic grids on interactive white board and
from electronic resource from student made community maps using a
grid.
Essential Question: What can distance measurements on maps tell us
about traveling over geographic areas?
I.

K: Students know how to calculate distances between two

places using basic addition or subtraction.
U: Students will understand how to determine the best way to
travel between two places according to a maps scale judging
distances.
D: Students will calculate, describe and write why traveling a
certain way between two places over a distance is preferred.
Standard Math: 2.21: The student will solve problems by completing
numerical sentences involving the basic facts for addition and
subtraction. The student will create story problems, using the
numerical sentences.
Standard Math 2.6: The student will demonstrate map skills by
constructing simple maps, using title, map legend, and compass rose.
II.

Materials for Learning Activities

PowerPoint-integrated slides in Smart board activity,
a. iPads or laptops with http://world-geography-games.com,
and
http://www.teacherled.com/resources/mapmaker/mapmake
rload.html

III.
Time

available tools for creative measurements activity for early

finishers of website activity:
1 rulers, base-10 block units, student feet and paper, pencils,
scissors, crayons, and others.

Procedures for Learning Activities

Steps

Materials

Introduction:
A way of explaining the use of directions on a map involves
describing to an individual how to go from one place to
another. Sometimes, if you know exactly how many turns
to make, you can tell a friend exactly how to go to a
location. If you dont, you can look at a map and write a
list of steps to take.
20
minutes

On a few occasions, when I could not remember how to go

somewhere, my mother would quickly draw a map from
memory and explain each turn and tell me how many turns
in total I would have to make.
Sometimes in a story, a character has a map where X
marks the spot, but to get there the character has to
count how many steps are taken in each direction as he or
she walks to get to the X on the map.
What we are going to do is create story problems to explain
number sentences using numbers and words to better
understand how we might move along a map. We might
even calculate how many different forms of transportation
someone may use to move from one continent to another.
Teacher example using large blue cubic units.
For example, On Smart board draw path described
while using Think aloud strategy: I want to travel to
the grocery store to buy food. I must travel (while tracing
a path), three blocks north (counting and marking blocks,
1, 2, 3, and then travel another two blocks, east (counting
and marking blocks 1, 2, before I reach the grocery store.
Draw arrows with compass rose directions. In total I went,
three blocks up plus another two blocks east or five blocks
in total, or in this math expression
3 +2 = 5 blocks from the home to get to the X grocery
store. In this example we used a scale of 1 ones unit for
each block on a base 10 scale.
In this next example we will use a plane. I want to see how
far away Virginia is from Western Canada nearby the state
of Alaska. If we use the same grid of base 10 units,
knowing that a plane travels faster than a car and can
travel greater distances, we can count how many units in
ones we travel to the x marked in Western Canada. The
number sentence story we form here is that it from the first
x in Virginia, we count 1, 2, 3,.10, 11 Count along
with students how many squares apart the Xs are in
a straight line and vertical line to keep it simple

Smart
board with
Power Point
integrated
slides

without diagonal counting. Traveling directly west we

first reach California at ## we need to change a plane and
travel ## north to the second X. Finally we say that these
locations on this grid map are ## base-10 units apart
according to our base-10 unit scale, or we can say that
they are ##-individual base-10 sticks apart and ## more
individual units.

35
minutes

Class practice using smaller yellow cubic units.

Call students up to Smart Board: Do one example of slide
4 for students then call 5 additional students to draw a line
from the green dot to another red dot and ask each of
the three students to count cubic spaces and identify
direction of compass rose movement as they write the
number sentence and formula on the board.
Instructional Strategies: Outline what the teachers and
students will do.
What you will do with a partner, using school rented iPads.
Now that we have done a few examples of creating number
sentences describing how we may move across a grid to
get to places on a world map, continental map, and state
map. The next challenge is making a number sentence
with a community map. On the laptops or iPads visit,
http://www.teacherled.com/resources/mapmaker/mapmake
rload.html, this interactive activity allows for you as
students to create your own community map on a grid
space. You must place a minimum of one house and any
other numbers of structures including a hospital, a school,
shops, parks, lakes and others of your choosing along with
roads to connect your community in your own creative way.
Print it in the class printer then write a number sentence
like the class examples describing how to get from your
house to other key locations calculating the distances
between grid spaces and telling me how to turn on your
map by moving north, south, east, or west to get to a
destination. Choose at least three destinations to calculate
distance for.
Keep Power point on display to show examples of
math distance directions for number sentences.
For students who need more practice identifying continents
and oceans they may play a geography matching game
from http://world-geography-games.com, selecting the
continents game, rivers game, or oceans game. Each
game continues until the student correctly matches all
locations while counting number of incorrect attempts and
not counting attempts of correct matches. To finish each
game students must correctly identify all components. The

Laptops or
iPads if
available
on
reservation
*

*Continge
ncy: If
iPads and
laptops
cannot be
reserved
for
communit
y gridmeasure
ment map
making
activity
alternate
assignme
nt will be
classroom
-map
making
activity**
May still
take up
approximat
ely 15-20

number of counted attempts will not count against

students since the games allow for infinite attempts to find
parts. Students can print out the finished page.

minutes for
completion.

During independent practice, the teacher will call a small

group of students to do hands-on scaffolding with unifix
cubes.

Unifix
cubes for
scaffolding
activity

Calculators will be made available for students if they have

difficulty with addition after checking with the teacher.

5
minutes

IV.

**For students who finish creating their community gridbased maps from from http://world-geography-games.com
early and have completed at least three number sentences
telling a short mathematical story in their formula for
traveling from one part of the map, the house, to another
of any location, they can then for additional work, create a
map of the classroom and design their own unit of
measurement describing directions and distances to and
from their desk to other areas of the room.
Summary/Closure:
Today we learned how to create a number sentence to
calculate and solve the distance between to areas, our
current location and a destination by hand.
In modern times these calculations are done automatically
on a device called a GPS, that uses satellites to tell us how
far away a destination is. We use this information to
determine the best mode of transportation. Whether it is
by driving, taking the bus, train, or airplane. These options
were not always available in previous centuries which
effected how people could get around or even how a
community or city would develop. In these examples in the
Smartboard activity, it would be ideal to take an airplane to
arrive somewhere within hours while a car would take a full
day or longer, the same with a train. In the class activity
we also observed how scale measurements can effect how
the distance between areas can change in how they are
presented with scales of units between the yellow
centimeter cubes and the blue inch cubes. Scales allow us
to see things from far away or close up as well, buildings,
communities, individual states, the whole country, or the
world, the scale of measurement changes not only to fit it
on the page but to put it in perspective for us to
understand the worlds we live in geographically and to
navigate our directions mathematically.

Assessment

Student community maps will be shared with the class and checked for
understanding of directions using compass roses and mathematical
accuracy of basic addition.
V.

Differentiation

Tier-up For greater challenge, if students feel they finish early with a
number sentence activity describing how far away a distance is, they
can remake a new map and create a number sentence describing how
many fewer units a location is by comparing paths to two or more
destinations.
Tier-down To teach up to other students their zone of proximal
development can be scaffolded by making available calculators for
those who have trouble with addition. In addition, the teacher can
work with a small group and make available hands on unifex cubes to
represent objects moving physically on a desk space of with a drawn
grid made by the teacher.
Multiple intelligences used in this lesson are visual-spatial, logicalmathematical, verbal-linguistic.
Visual-spatial intelligence is shown through the act of creating a
map on the computer that is not based on a real community
allows for the student to be creative in his or her own expression
of understanding the material in a visual way.
The use of logical-mathematical intelligences is shown through
the writing mathematical formula that matches a number
sentence that is written in a short one sentence story form.
Students must translate their number sentence into a formula.
For example, To get to the intended destination in the
community map you must move five units west and two units
north for a total of seven units in distance from the place of
origin. This sentence that might be written is then rewritten as
5+2=7 in a formulaic expression of the sentence.
The verbal-linguistic intelligence is expressed through the longer
number sentence story that uses vocabulary of compass rose
directions to express knowledge of movement on a map.
The application available at
http://www.teacherled.com/resources/mapmaker/mapmakerload.html,
is free and easily accessible to all students with basic symbols and
ease for elementary student map making exercises.
Students who finish early or wish to be challenged will be given the
chance to create or choose their own measurement tool, a pencil,
ruler, crayon, their own feet by cutting out the shape and using it to
create number sentence directions to describe:

1. Where is their desk from the door and how many feet or
other units it is from the door and how to get there.
2. Where is the classroom sink? Described with their units of
choice and number sentence totals and directions.
3. Where is the classroom library? Described with their units of
choice and number sentence totals and directions.
VI.

Technology Integration
2. Smart board with PowerPoint slides included.
3. iPad rental or laptop rental for all students to then use:
a. http://www.teacherled.com/resources/mapmaker/mapmake
rload.html
b. with http://world-geography-games.com,
4. Mechanical technologies:
a. Student feet, rulers, crayons or other devices students may
use to create in-classroom maps and measurements for
more number sentence practice.

VI.

Reflection

slide 1

slide 2

slide 4

slide 5

slide 3

slide 6

slide 7

References
Riley, S. (2008). TeacherLED Interactive Whiteboard Resource Map
Maker.
Retrieved October 30, from
http://www.teacherled.com/resources/mapmaker/mapmakerload.
html
World Geography Games. (2015). World Geography Games - Let's play
and learn about
the world. Retrieved October 30, from http://world-geographygames.com