🌍Start with the difference between a map and a globe, then build up to compass directions, map keys, grids and scale. By the end of two weeks, students are labeling the continents and oceans and finding places with latitude and longitude.
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The Maps and Globes Unit is a 45-page geography resource for 2nd, 3rd and 4th grade, with enough review to use in 5th grade as well. It teaches the core map skills students need and pairs them with the 7 continents, the 5 oceans and common landforms.
Lessons begin with a simple question: how is a map different from a globe? From there, students learn the tools that make a map readable, including the compass rose, the map key, the map grid and the map scale. A types of maps section asks students to decide which map they would use for a given job, which builds real reasoning instead of rote labeling.
World geography comes next. Information pages introduce the 7 continents and 5 oceans, a world map is colored and labeled, and individual continent fact pages plus a continent puzzle help students remember where each landmass sits. Lessons on the equator, hemispheres, latitude and longitude show how a location can be described precisely.
Twelve landform glossary cards and identification activities add physical geography vocabulary such as the words students meet in science and reading, and review puzzles bring the whole unit together before the assessment.
A two-week study plan, teacher notes, a unit test, an award and answer keys make the unit easy to run in social studies blocks, centers, homeschool lessons, homework, sub plans, review, enrichment or intervention.
📖 Teaching guide · 12 min readTeaching Map Skills, Continents and Oceans in 2nd–4th Grade: A Two-Week Geography GuideRead the guide →Map tools come first, so continents and oceans make sense when students reach them. The "Which Map Would You Use?" activities and grid and scale lessons ask students to use maps, not just color them.
It is written for 2nd through 4th grade and works as review for 5th grade.
It includes a two-week study plan with teacher notes.
Yes. A unit assessment, geography review puzzles and answer keys are included.
Yes. There are lessons on the equator, hemispheres, latitude and longitude.
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