GEOGRAPHY MAPS

This year we are using"Olde World Style Maps" by Homeschool in the Woods. The maps are available for download or CD. We got the CD. It has TONS of black line maps, for each continent, most countries, and even some ancient maps. Each one can be printed with or without labels, so you can label them yourself if you want. The CD also has 40 neat notebooking pages (report forms, fact sheets, full color flags, etc).

If you would like to download sample maps, go to the website above and click on the blue button (middle left of page). We have loved everything we have ordered through them (Civil War, American Revolution, Artist Activity Paks, and Early 19th Century).

Other options for FREE maps are:
Houghton Mifflin Social Studies has good maps, but not very many of them

World Map to color (younger)

Doing US States? Here's a good website

Free Blank Outline Maps simple, blank, but LOTS of maps

WorldAtlas.com has lots of countries and continents as well as testing maps

GEO PUZZLES

We are getting Geo Puzzles for each continent to use this year and they seem to be helping the kids remember where each country belongs.

The puzzles cost about $14-$15 each (GeoPuzzles on Amazon) but we only purchase a new one every few months, so the cost is spread out some. They have Europe, North America, Latin America, Asia and Africa.

The kids (especially Bailey - 10) like them. I have them choose one mapping activity a day: GeoPuzzle, Seterra, Sheppards or the talking globe (we have the Bratz version, but you could also use the Leap Frog version), it's their choice. All of these activities have different ways to learn the same information, so it's really cemented into their memory by the end of the week.

TRAVEL SCRAPBOOK LAPBOOKS

The kids (and me, too!) are really having fun making "Travel Scrapbooks". They actually call them "Scrapbook Lapbooks" because we add all sorts of foldables, flipbooks, stickers, photos, etc. to each page. Really, the pages are turning out way cuter than I thought they would.

The scrapbooks are from WalMart and are the cheapest ones I could find. The general idea (Travel Diary) along with the main titles and some postcards are from the Winter Promise Children Around the World curriculum, and then we added lots of our own "goodies" to it.









This is a World Map from Olde World Style Maps CD from Homeschool in the Woods. Bailey added this one to the front of her scrapbook.

This page is of the British Isles/United Kingdom. We got pictures of Big Ben, the White Cliffs of Dover, the British Museum, English gardens, Wedgwood China, Stonehenge, Harry Potter, Shakespeare, and more! It's a full page. We probably should have made it 2 pages. Some of the stuff is under other things that flip up or open, but that actually makes it fun to look at!

For all our foldable resources we go to Homeschool Share, and get cool things like the country flag and "Where in the World Is...?" foldables. These are pages from both girl's scrapbooks below.

Another fun item we add to the pages is copies of local money (from WWII). You can barely see the Denmark coin with the hole in it. I made color copies of all of my grandparent's old coins and paper bills and we use them on the appropriate country.

Background papers and stickers are from Michael's. They have lots of fun travel themed stuff. Hint: Check out Michael's or Hobby Lobby when they have stickers or scrapbook papers at half price.

I also made some little pages for Musicians, Scientists, Authors, and Artists. If some famous Artist came from the country we are studying, then we add their name to the list and glue it on the pages. We might also find some of their work to add. We do the same for Authors, Musicians, etc. Here we did the Netherlands and have van Gogh, Rembrant, Rubens, and Brueghel (with a few examples).

Amanda is also researching vital statistics for each country (language, some words in that language, currency, religion, government, etc) and filling out a little form I made her.


We get most of the pictures from internet searches (Google Image search), then print them out fairly small so we can add lots to the page. When we learn something intersting about the country, we try to find a good picture to represent it (like wooden shoes, windmills, Swiss Alps, tulips, cheese, etc for Netherlands/Switzerland).