Africa at their feet: Cedar Rapids kids learn geography using giant map

CEDAR RAPIDS - The center of the Harding Middle School media center is normally filled with tables, chairs and shelves.

On Friday, Feb. 2, 2011, it was filled with a continent.

The school, along with Franklin Middle School and the African American Museum of Iowa rented a giant map of Africa from the National Geographic Society to help teach geography.

This is the second year the schools have rented the map, which costs between $500 and $700 for a two week rental. The hardest part of doing so is finding a place to put it, according to Harding sixth-grade teacher Cindy Smith. The map is 35 feet by 26 feet, weighs 102 pounds and covered the entire central portion of the Harding media center.

The sixth-graders normally don't study African history until the spring, but the availability of the map, timed with current unrest in Egypt and Black History Month warranted getting a head start on that unit.

“We've been briefly talking about and telling them to stay up on current events, as well as discussing the slave trade, so they have some overview awareness,” she said.

Some of the activities the students used with the map include games to identify different locations and landmarks on the continent, as well as a game where students paired up and directed each other across the map using cardinal directions.

Sixth-grader Cass Zimmerman, 12, was able to find the Congo in Central Africa fairly easily.

“If you have a good navigator, it works out pretty good,” he said.

The map's rental was made possible through a district pilot program that could potentially be expanded to other schools if successful, according to Smith.

“We'll discuss whether or not it's worth the time, energy and money and if it's something we want to do again, because chances are if we do we'll have to raise the funds for it,” Smith said.

Smith is optimistic as the map has been very well received by almost all her students. They set aside class time to discuss whether or not the school should get more maps, and students like Andie Trotter, 12, were enthusiastic.

“It's pretty cool,” she said.