Hometown USA

Objectives:
Create a 3-D model of a town using easily available materials provided by the students. Give students the opportunity to view -ground truth- (what is actually seen by someone on the ground) versus an aerial view. Students will be asked to tell which view is more accurate; which view provides a better or clearer view of terrain features and land use; which view is subject to distortion.

Time Duration: 3-50 minute sessions

Grade Level: 4-5

Concepts Explored:
Proportional reasoning, patterns and functions, measurement collection and recording of data, comparing and contrasting

MateriaIs:
large sheets of butcher paper, colored markers, scissors, yarn, toys and paper models or blocks, page of map symbols, large flat work areas such as large tables or linoleum floors

Background:
Another activity in the Top Down package introduces students to the perspectives involved in mapping (see What You See Isn't What You Get: Perspective in Mapping). While the horizontal or ground truth view is familiar to students, here they will be asked to transfer that information into an aerial view. This involves spatial reasoning and can be difficult for some children. By using concrete and familiar experiences with the toys and models, students can see how maps evolve.

Procedures:

Using small wooden blocks, toy cars, colored markers, construction paper and large butcher paper, students will work in groups to diagram and build a town. Locations to be drawn should include schools, places of worship, shops and malls, homes, highways, rivers, railroads and airports. Children's books such as Richard Scary's Busy Book have cut out diagrams of buildings that could be used for models. Teachers should decide on the scale of the town before the students begin and add buildings and parks, cars and roadways appropriately. Perhaps only a portion of your town or city should be represented. Alternatively, one student group could build a square smile of a city while another group builds a model of the entire city or county.

After the town is complete, buildings can be removed and their positions marked with the standard map symbols. This activity helps develop the concept of three dimensional objects being represented by a two dimensional symbol.

Once the two dimensional map is complete, students then overlay a grid system on their maps using yarn or string to represent the grid lines.

Location conventions with alphabetic and numeric coordinates as used on road maps will be transferred to the student maps.

Have students find the map coordinates for (depending on the scale of the map) their home, their school, city/town hall, the airport, the bus station, the sports complex, municipal swimming pool, etc.

Extensions:
Explore the origin of longitude and latitude in the development of maps using historical maps. Older maps were based only on ground level observations and our current technology and remote sensing allows a more accurate aerial view of our world.

Be sure to impress upon the students that a model car or bus used in the model town is probably not to scale. Ask questions such as, "What if the car/bus was really that big? Could it fit on the street? Could it turn the corner?"

Map Symbol Sheet:
The map symbol sheet shows some common symbols used to represent features on a map. Have students draw them on construction paper and color them as shown. Cut the symbols out and glue or tape them to the map after removing the three-dimensional objects. Have students bring in road maps and/or atlases to add other symbols to the symbol sheet. Discuss with the students how appropriate some symbols are at the scale of their maps.

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