Plan and take a road trip through your state

In this lesson, students will learn about the geography of their state as they create a travel plan, construct a map with Bing maps, research various locations throughout the selected states, calculate distances, and write postcards to send home.

Objectives

Students will become familiar with the geography of their state.

Learning outcomes

Students will develop a travel plan for a trip across their state or other states.
Students will use Bing maps to create a custom map of their trip.
Students will write informational postcards home about their travel destinations and publish them with Office Publisher.

Lesson procedure

Introduction

How much do you know about the geography of the region or state where you live? What places have you visited in your state? [List places on board or projector.]

What do you know about each of the locations?

[To highlight the next point, you can research a little known place of interest in your state or geographical fact (for example, the number and location of the national parks) that students might be curious about. During the lesson, ask them if they know of this place or a geographical fact, and then tell them about its location and significance.]

Part of geography, the study of the earth and its features, inhabitants, and phenomena, is the study of places and regions. Today, with globalization, it is more important than ever to understand different places and regions around the world. To be an informed global citizen, it is also essential for you to understand your own local area.

In this activity, you will learn about various towns, cities, and places of interest within your state by planning and taking a two-week road trip. During your trip you must:

Visit one or more major cities with populations of 1,000,000+.
Visit two or more cities with a population between 500,000 and 999,999.
Visit one or more minor cities with a population between 100,000 and 499,999.
Visit one or more towns with a population between 20,000 and 99,000.
Visit the state capital.
Visit two or more other areas of interest within the state.

Student activity

The Student guide (Office Word document, 21 KB) includes Step 1, "Plan and map your route," Step 2, "Research destinations and write postcards home," and Step 3, "Complete your trip and record it."

Lesson extension activities

Assign each student or group of students a different state and have them share their maps and postcards with the class.
Ask students to create budgets for their trips, in addition to travel plans and postcards.
Ask individual students or teams to select different areas of geographical interest in the state to research and then present what they find about the location, its history, and other geographical information to the class in a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation.

Conclusion

Assess students on:

Their route planner and map. Check that all required locations are included.
Their postcards. Check that all information is included, interesting sights are represented, and that the writing is correct, coherent, and interesting.