Compton's Interactive World Atlas

Lesson Plan

Created by John Fusari

Introduction

This lesson is based on the use of the Compton’s Interactive World Atlas software program, which is a geographic reference tool that allows students to learn about various aspects of the world’s countries and topics concerning the earth itself. The main theme of this lesson is to the tropical zone of the earth, which is the area between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn. The lesson is intended for middle school students in the discipline of either geography or social studies. The lesson should take a 40-minute class period, and the students will need enough computers to at least work in pairs. The instructor will need a projection system to play the focus video from the computer software and to effectively complete the guided instruction part of the lesson. The intent of the lesson is to have the students actively learn about the climate, landscape, and population of the major cities and countries of the tropics. The students will also be able to classify, compare, and evaluate findings about these various places.

Objectives

Students will be able to:

1) Locate the major cities and their countries found in the tropics.

2) Describe the climate and landscape, and list the total population of the major countries of the tropics.

3) Compare and evaluate the climate, landscapes, and total population of the major countries of the tropics.

Instructional Material

Software: Compton’s Interactive World Atlas by SoftKey International Inc.

Printed handout for Activity

Overhead projector with a blank transparency and copy of the above handout

Lesson Sequence

 Using a blank transparency, the teacher writes the word "Tropics" on it and asks the students the open-ended question, "What do you think the weather might be like there?" After writing down several responses, the teacher follows with the question, "What do you think it might look like there?" After writing several responses, the teacher finishes with the question, "How many of you might think this is a place you might like to live?"

 This question and answer period should take roughly 5 minutes. The teacher focuses attention on the theme of the lesson by showing the video on the tropics found under the weather function in Compton’s Interactive World Atlas. Once the teacher accesses this part of the software, the teacher clicks on the "red palm tree" icon, which immediately starts the video on the tropics. While the video is playing, the teacher will pass the handout activity out to the students who are at their computers.

 After the 30 second video, the teacher can transition to the activity by comparing what the class discussed earlier with the information found in the clip and then announce the first objective which is to locate the major cities of the tropics. Those cities will be frozen on the last frame, which is a map of the tropic zone with the cities highlighted. It is here where the teacher will perform guided instruction by showing the students how to locate the countries of those cities and where students can find information on the climate, landscape, and total population of those countries. The students will be putting this information in a grid-like handout which has the headings "Major City/Country, Climate, Landscape, and Total population" horizontally, while eight major cities of the Tropics are listed vertically down the left side of the paper.

 The first major city is Mexico City. It is located by going to the world map function, which places a world atlas in front of the user. From there, one clicks on the areas closest to Mexico City, until there is a close-up map of Mexico. Have the students mark the country Mexico in the appropriately marked box on the handout. It is also in this position where the user can activate the profile function, which gives in-depth background on various aspects of Mexico. Once the students are in the background of Mexico, they can slide down to the "climate and landscape" heading to find its description. From there, ask the students to summarize what it says and to add information in the appropriately marked boxes on the handout. Then take the students to the heading marked "people" and have them find the latest total population count of Mexico and place that number in the appropriately marked box. After this guided instruction, the students only need to follow the same procedures for the other seven cities.

 Once the students embark on the activity independently, the teacher will then monitor and answer questions raised by the students while they complete the task. The students should be allowed 15 to 20 minutes to complete the activity.

 When it looks like most of the class is done with the handout, the teacher brings closure to the lesson by allowing the students to compare the findings of each country's climate, landscape, and total population. This part of the lesson would be more efficient by using the transparency of the handout on the overhead projector. For further closure, the teacher might ask, "What countries have rain forests, which have deserts, and which three countries are most populated?" Finally, one could end the lesson by surveying the class again about how many people would still like to live in the tropics.

Evaluation

Correcting the handout assesses the stated learning objectives of the lesson by checking that the students have the proper information in the proper categories of their handout. The teacher, while correcting the handout orally, may have the students switch papers for peer editing also. If the teacher feels the students were having a difficult time finding the information or completing the task, they may want to extend the lesson into the next class.

 1/28/03