Students love to build, design, and create. I try to incorporate projects into my curriculum that foster these concepts so that students can use their artistic creativity and mathematical minds to demonstrate their understanding of scientific topics.
My 8th grade students are a exciting group of kids who love to learn.
They have diverse backgrounds as well as diverse learning needs. They love hands on activities that incorporate multiple subjects such as math, science, and art. Our school is a small middle school of around 400 students in New York City.
My Project
These materials will be used to create 3D topographic maps. Our planet has so many wonderful features such as mountains, streams, canyons, plains, and volcanoes to name a few. Students will first design a landscape of some of these features in the form of a topographic map. Then students will use the foam board to cut out a base which will hold the foam sheets. The foam sheets will be cut to match the levels of their topographic maps. Students will create a three dimensional model of their map.
This project will help my students visualize how a topographic map is actually representing a 3D surface.
It will also allow students to measure and cut the foam into the shape of the land, such as rivers, lakes, and craters. Visualizing scientific concepts can be very challenging and this project will allow me to assess their knowledge of how topographic maps are created and the information they present.
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