USING VIRTUAL REALITY MODELING LANGUAGE TO TEACH MAPS AND LEGENDS
Developed using the TECHNOLOGY AND LEARNING CONTINUUM MODEL
By Glyn Ellis of Southeast Elementay School, Valdosta City Schools, Valdosta, Georgia
|
List the objectives that support chosen learning standard goals and call for learners to gain information. |
List the instructional strategies that might be used to accomplish the objectives. |
List technology resources that might be used to accomplish the objectives. |
Create & describe learning activities that incorporate identified instructional strategies and available technology resources in a way that allows the learner to accomplish objectives. |
Think about creative forms of assessment, list some possibilities, match assessments with objectives. |
|
|
Georgia QCC Learning Standards |
Objectives |
||||
|
Subject: Maps Strand/Course: 4th grade Topic: Reading maps and using legends Number: NA Standard: Identifies physical regions within the United States and describes major physical features of each region. SKILL: Uses physical maps. |
-Know that a map represents an areas of the Earth’s surface
-Use a map legend -Recognize terrain features from a map and mentally visualize them -Navigate using a map
|
-Presentation
-Demonstration -Discussion |
- 1 Computer
-TVator (connects the TV to the computer for students to see what is on the monitor OR other projection device
|
An interactive map will be used in a demonstration mode to teach
students that symbols and colors on a map represent actual terrain features.
The map will first be used as a flat map to review symbols.
Then it will be manipulated into the interactive mode where the
symbolized features become three dimensional.
|
Students may view the website on their own (that uses the vrml technology) and use the computer's PRINT SCREEN function to demonstrate they can navigate the map, read the legend, and print materials demonstrating their knowledge of how features on the map are reflected in the legend. |
Initiating
Activity Learning
Activity: (15 Minutes)
1. Learners should
first be shown page “Map Characteristics”.
- Emphasize the legend. Each map has its own legend, and they can all be different, so they must all be viewed when reading a given map.
2. Show the “Legend” page. Discuss the meaning of the different colors, then have students copy the info on a sheet of paper so they can refer to it while viewing the map.
3. Go to the map site www.edcenter.sdsu.edu/projects/vrml/lod.wrl (Suggestion: This is best done by having the website “up” and behind the presentation pages. Simply minimize the presentation pages when ready to go to the map.)
- Review the colors on the map and discuss what each terrain feature represented would actually look like.
- Point out a spot in the valley at the northwest part of the map. Discuss the best way to get from this spot to the south end of the river at the edge of the map. (Down the valley, followed by a right turn at the river to the end.) Also discuss the terrain along the trip, such as the need to take the left fork in the valley to avoid a dead end, low mountains off to the right, and high mountains to the left as you travel down the river.
4. Press left button on map, which places you at the beginning point in the valley as indicated above. Then make the trip down the valley and the river as discussed with the class. Point out the features you expected to see.
5. Repeat and discuss as desired.
-
Different maps show different types of information such as:
boundaries
population
terrain
features