Bright Ideas

There are loads of cirriculum related activities you can undertake with the Digital Worlds GIS 2, from Key Stage 1 right through to Key Stage 4 and beyond. Below is just a small selection...

Where are we in the world?

Use the Globe or the world map and get the children to identify where they are in the world. It might also be fun to use Google earth as the starting point using the interactive white board at the front of the class; then switch to the satellite image of the UK and slowly zoom into your county. Ask what features the children can see on the satellite image, remembering that this is a view from space. Can they see any man made features (nature is never perfectly straight so look for linear roads or urban areas)? Can they see the field boundaries and perhaps estimate the type of land use? Can they estimate what time of the year the satellite was taken by the colour of the crops in the field? As the satellite imagery starts to pixelate drop-in the aerial photography of your area. What additional features can be seen by the photographs? Why are they in greater detail? Pan around and really explore the photos get the children to tell you what they are seeing (school, church, reservoir, motorway etc).

This is simple quiz and can work well at all age groups within KS3-4. Part 1, start by displaying on an interactive white board, the satellite image of the UK but have the OS 1:250,000 over the top but completely transparent. Choose 10 urban areas, 5 rivers, 5 peninsulas, 5 national parks etc. across the UK and mark them on the satellite image (give them numbers or letters). Ask the children to name these marked areas. Part 2, now ask the children to determine less prominent or obvious urban areas e.g. Macclesfield or Taunton and ask the children to come to the front of the class and mark on the white board where these are. Once completed fade in the OS map to reveal the answers.

Urban sprawl

This exercise is for pupils KS3-KS4 and utilises the historic maps and aerial photos of your area. Starting with the historic map, draw the extent of the “urban footprint” that delineates the limit of the built environment for your village / town in the 1860’s. Similarly, draw the extent of the “urban footprint” on the present day aerial photography. Create a map of your drawing, indicating the areas of sprawl. Use the measuring tool to calculate the area of growth between the two timelines.

This can be purely a classroom exercise or a fieldtrip

Brief the class on the types of land use around the school. Show them what types of crops might be growing. Make a printout of the OS 1:25000 map for the local area and give a copy to everyone. Take the children on a walk out of school and around the surrounding area. Stop at appropriate places and get the children to determine what the land use is and annotate their maps. Back in class, ask the children to transfer their annotated maps into the software. Get them to make a map, with legend, scale bar and north arrow.

This exercise works particularly well in coastal areas that are known to have experience significant erosion e.g. Spurn Head. Using the historic maps from the 1860’s and 1900’s draw the shoreline - often described as the “mean sea level” mark where the shore meets the sea. Using the aerial photos, delineate the line of the land / sea boundary. You now have three lines indicating the shoreline position from 1860, 1900 and 2001. Calculate the erosion between each timeline using the measuring tool. There will be areas on the map that have experienced more erosion than others. Measure the smallest and largest. It is also possible to calculate the rate of change by distance / number of years. For example, if the distance between 1860 and 2001 lines is 78 metres then it would be;

Historic Place Names

Be a Geography detective! Tell the children about the local place names and what they mean. Dividing the children into groups, ask them to study the digital OS map of their area and make a list of any settlements that end with repeating endings. For example, around Canterbury many villages end with “bourne”, “ham” and “ton”.

Map symbols

Divide the children into pairs and get them to identify all the symbols they can find in a one kilometre grid square.  These are marked in blue on the 1:5000 map Ordnance Survey map.  You might ask the children to copy the symbols from the screen onto a sheet of paper and then identify them using a key that you have duplicated in advance.  Alternatively you might direct them to the Ordnance Survey website (www.ordsvy.gov.uk)

Historic Place Names

Be a Geography detective! Tell the children about the local place names and what they mean. Dividing the children into groups, ask them to study the digital OS map of their area and make a list of any settlements that end with repeating endings. For example, around Canterbury many villages end with “bourne”, “ham” and “ton”.

Exploring the past

Get the children to make a list of all the historical sites they can find in the area.  The current Ordnance Survey map will provide a good starting point for this investigation as it marks the most important remains but the 1870 map will be another valuable source of information.  See if the children can sort the sites into groups – Prehistoric, Roman, Anglo-Saxon, Medieval and Modern.  What does this tell you about your area?  For example, was it important for industry or are most of the sites of military significance? Ask pupils if they can identify where the school was in 1870 and compare to its new location.  What other features or buildings are still in the town/ village today.

Development challenge

Many parts of England are under huge pressure from development.  Divide the children into groups, ask them to look at the maps of your area and decide on the best place for a new village or settlement.  They might consider a number of different sites and draw up a list of advantages and disadvantages for each.  Encourage them to consider a range of factors such as water supply, light pollution and construction traffic alongside more obvious issues.  Some pupils might show their plans on screen and describe them to the rest of the class.

Collecting numbers

Select an area of 5 x 5 grid squares from the OS 1: 50,000 map. Search the 25 grid squares for any numbers you can find.  Look for contour lines, spot heights, road numbers, grid numbers even settlements with numbers in their name. Use the key to interpret the different numbers and explain what each number means.

Firstly, ask the children to estimate their route to school and to write this down. Suggest ways that will help them, e.g. how big is their stride if they walk to school or how far is it from one end of the street to the other. Now get them to identify their house and the school on the aerial photography. Using the measuring tool, ask the children to measure the exact route that they take to school. Teacher can collect all measurements and determine the closest to the original estimation or take into excel and calculate average route to school.

My route to school – extended (Environmental Studies)

An extension of the above exercise would be to associate a calorie value to distance walked to school or a pollution value to those children who are driven to school. The school run is taken twice a day, five times a week and thirty or more weeks a year amounting to a significant calorie burn or CO2 emission. By using these simple calculations a very local and mundane event like the school run can be shown to have significant impact on nation and global issues. (Use http://www.smmtco2.co.uk/co2search2.asp for CO2 emission values for cars at g/km)

Car Park Maths

Choose a local car park that you can see on the aerial photos where the white-lines of the parking spaces are easily discernable. Get the children to count the total of car park spaces. Now count the cars that are currently parked. Ask for a percentage calculation of the cars in the car park! Can they express this as a fraction?

Along the river

Trace the route of a stream or river on the map. Use aerial photographs or satellite image of your area.  What are the different features and places along the way?  Get the children to make up a poem or story about the changes in the landscape.  They might imagine the things a bird or water creature might see. Describe the journey from a small boat or make up what happens when a child drops a toy into the water.

Alternative routes

Using the map of your area get the children to plot their route to school using the drawing tool.  How far do they come?  Do they pass any points of interest? Now challenge them to find two or three different routes.  What would be the advantages and disadvantages of these other options?

Habitats

Working in small groups, get the children to name the different habitats they can find in their area.  These might include parks, woods, fields, orchards, marshes, ponds, streams, suburban gardens, built up areas and so on.  Now see if they can associate a bird and creature with each environment.  In what way are they suited to these different places? 

Musical journey

Plot a route from school to the centre of town/community using the OS 1:25,000 maps or the 1:10,000 aerial photos.  Mark off contrasting stopping points along the way which will be expected to have different sound characteristics (e.g. a park garden or church yard, a busy shopping street, a quiet side road, a market, a car park, a supermarket).  Record the sounds on digital recorder, or list different sounds heard.  Bring sounds back to school and compose music to capture the different character of each place. Structure the music and choose timbres and textures according to the main features of the recorded sound (e.g. bird song, car engines, footsteps etc).  Record the composed music and arrange for it to be activated by clicking on one of the ‘hotspots’ you have marked on the map.

Art in a map

Take one grid square and expand it to make a giant abstract image.  First make the square 50 times as big then scale up the details in that square using a 2B pencil.  Firm up the outlines with black pen, or paint. Finally choose strongly contrasting or subtly related colours (unrelated to the original map colours) to fill in the shapes, lines and symbols in the grid square.

Woodland tour

Tell the children they have been asked by the local newspaper to devise a tour round nearby woodlands for readers to follow in their spare time.  You can set the parameters e.g. it must be between 3 and 5 km long, start and finish at a railway station or whatever.  You will also have to decide on the method of transport e.g. foot, bicycle, car.  Alternatively you could leave the pupils free to choose. If you set additional constraints e.g. the tour must link several historical sites, it will make the task progressively more challenging.