Unit Theme: World Geography - Continents/Oceans

Unit Theme Verse

1 Corinthians 10:26 - The earth is the Lord's.

We used the following song to help us remember the names of all of the continents:

We used our trusty inflatable globe to explore the continents (and to have some fun games of catch/volleyball).

Map Painting

First, the kids painted a piece of cardboard blue...

 ...then, they painted cut-outs of the continents (don't mind the innacuracy of my free-handed efforts).

 After everything dried, they put it all together to create their map and then added labels for the continents, oceans, and the equator (piece of black yarn).

Caleb's

Meredith's

Paper Mache Globe

We put 2 layers of newspaper strips onto our inflated balloons using the paper mache paste mixture of 1 Cup of flour to 2 Cups of water.  The kids did not like this as much as I thought they would...it was too "gross" (Caleb's description).  We managed to get them over the gross factor enough to finish the first layer.  I just did the next layer by myself after the first dried.  This was sooooo messy.  I knew it wouldn't be the cleanest activity ever, but I surely didn't anticipate the incredible amount of paper mache paste splatters that I would have to scrape off of the chairs and table and floors!  Even my curtains needed to be washed.  The kids were careful, but this stuff seriously got everywhere!

I had actually never done paper mache like this before (shocking, right?), so I was a little nervous that when we popped the balloons, the outer shell of newspaper strips/paste would shrivel up as well.  We were very pleased that when we popped the balloons, the outside layer was not at all affected.  Success!

Now for the fun part...

Shane didn't make a globe, but he did enjoy painting on some paper!

 Finished products - Caleb's on the left, Meredith's on the right.  (Yes, we know that the earth is not oval-shaped.  I didn't have any perfectly round balloons on hand.)

Continents Books

The kids put together books with the papers they worked on this week.

Covers of their books (Meredith's left, Caleb's right)

We used printables (FREE!) from here and here and here to help us learn to identify the continents and the oceans of the world.  We also learned about some map-reading strategies.

The inside of M's book...

Map and Globe Coloring (she got her colors turned around a bit on the globe page...oh well!)

The inside of C's book...

Globe and World Map Coloring

Map/Following Directions Activity

Continents/Oceans Identification

Underwater Craft

After talking about how the earth is covered mostly in water, we made this contact paper/tissue paper craft...

I wish my camera better captured the colors.  They look really fun with the light coming through the back.

Meredith's...

Caleb's...

Don't mind the red fishie's runny eye...we had a glue mishap.

 Next up, we will continue learning about geography by exploring other biomes (tundra, desert, rainforest, etc...)