geography: any reason to have child color in landforms? (in addition to labeling stuff)

[serendipitous journey]

My elder is doing MapTrek geography for our Early Modern terms, and I'm wondering if it is useful to have him do the "color your map" bit.  He is not a very neat color-er and doesn't want to do it: he CAN be neat when he needs to but coloring has never been his thing.  On the other hand sometimes these things have side benefits, like maybe they help with retention and/or general focus/good habits. 

FWIW, the MapTrek coloring is very basic: all the land would be green, and all the water masses, blue. 

thanks in advance! 

[Ellie]

Yes. He needs the visual of the different landmasses and water and all that.

[serendipitous journey]

36 minutes ago, Ellie said:

Yes. He needs the visual of the different landmasses and water and all that.

They are already shaded -- the water grey, the land white.  Still think it is an important visual? 

and: thanks for your help!

[domestic_engineer]

I don't know if there's a reason to color landforms or not.  What is your end goal of doing the map work?   Retention of the material?  So, if he can retain the info without coloring, I'd vote that your main goal is met.  It depends on how your kiddos' brains work and what your goals are for the map work.

But what really prompted me to respond was to propose the idea that you could modify the instructions to avoid coloring yet still improving focus or whatever .... for example, instead of *coloring* the water, *crosshatch* the water blue ... or "use these blue dot stickers to cover the water blue or make a mosaic of torn construction paper pieces ... or here's a marker with a big fat tip so there's less coloring required ... or use a do-a-dot marker ... or ...........

[Ellie]

9 hours ago, serendipitous journey said:

They are already shaded -- the water grey, the land white.  Still think it is an important visual? 

and: thanks for your help!

Yes. Same reason. 🙂 "Shading" isn't the same as colors. I want to see COLOR! 🙂 Also, I would encourage him to color well, KWIM? Neatly.  

[serendipitous journey]

1 hour ago, Ellie said:

Yes. Same reason. 🙂 "Shading" isn't the same as colors. I want to see COLOR! 🙂 Also, I would encourage him to color well, KWIM? Neatly.  

Thanks!  This was my feeling: he is a child who can do the work, but his brain automatically skitters around and tries to find shortcuts.  Which means that I need to check everything I ask him to do, and insist on re-dos until he gets in better habits, and then monitor the results, and so I tend to pick my battles.  🙂 

Good to know you think this is a worthwhile one to pick!  I really appreciate your feedback. 

[serendipitous journey]

10 hours ago, domestic_engineer said:

I don't know if there's a reason to color landforms or not.  What is your end goal of doing the map work?   Retention of the material?  So, if he can retain the info without coloring, I'd vote that your main goal is met.  It depends on how your kiddos' brains work and what your goals are for the map work.

But what really prompted me to respond was to propose the idea that you could modify the instructions to avoid coloring yet still improving focus or whatever .... for example, instead of *coloring* the water, *crosshatch* the water blue ... or "use these blue dot stickers to cover the water blue or make a mosaic of torn construction paper pieces ... or here's a marker with a big fat tip so there's less coloring required ... or use a do-a-dot marker ... or ...........

What a great idea!  In addition to having a brain that automatically tries to shortcut stuff, he is a really sweet child and will help me troubleshoot things; I can get his help brainstorming a solution, or set of solutions that meet the goals, and it'll give him some space for creativity.  AND give me an excuse to get do-a-dot markers, maybe, which I've always wanted ...

Edited December 19, 2019 by serendipitous journey

[domestic_engineer]

5 minutes ago, serendipitous journey said:

What a great idea!  In addition to having a brain that automatically tries to shortcut stuff, he is a really sweet child and will help me troubleshoot things; I can get his help brainstorming a solution, or set of solutions that meet the goals, and it'll give him some space for creativity.  AND give me an excuse to get do-a-dot markers, maybe, which I've always wanted ...

if you use a do-a-dot marker, be sure to use heavier paper as it's pretty wet. 

... and personally, I would respectfully argue that coloring is *not* a battle to fight.  But I'm not a color-er and always disliked coloring assignments in school; it seemed like busywork and a waste of my time😄.   So take my opinion with a grain of salt.

If you're looking to build conscientiousness,  why not use more meaningful tasks like folding laundry?  Or an activity that requires precision such as origami?  Then they feel the natural consequences of cutting corners.

OR ... make him color neatly *something that matters to him*.  I noticed on of my kid's coloring ability seemingly improved dramatically when the coloring sheet was something of their choosing.  Another kid's coloring ability seemed to improve dramatically when switching to adult coloring pages when the white spaces were much smaller.

But again - all this talk is about coloring and not geography.  So we need to define what we are trying to achieve, especially when we have to pick our battles.  I'd venture to say that a lot of people have learned geography with only shaded maps or without coloring in landforms. 😉. And will forcing him to color neatly just breed resentment and a "git-r-done" attitude to mapwork and become obstacles to learning?  (Not that I'm resentful of all the coloring I had to do in school.... hahaha.)

[serendipitous journey]

On 12/19/2019 at 9:00 AM, domestic_engineer said:

...

... and personally, I would respectfully argue that coloring is *not* a battle to fight.  But I'm not a color-er and always disliked coloring assignments in school; it seemed like busywork and a waste of my time😄.   So take my opinion with a grain of salt.

...

domestic_engineer, thanks for presenting the other side for me to think about.  I really, really appreciate having a more rounded perspective. 

I might let him pick between coloring in and writing in cursive.  🙂  or something like that ...

Edited December 22, 2019 by serendipitous journey

[Quercus]

I think the idea is that coloring those things in helps them remember the boundaries, so they can better recognize them on sight. Puzzles with country-shaped pieces probably do the same thing, but I think you'd be hard pressed to find landform-shaped puzzle pieces.

[serendipitous journey]

5 hours ago, Quercus said:

I think the idea is that coloring those things in helps them remember the boundaries, so they can better recognize them on sight. Puzzles with country-shaped pieces probably do the same thing, but I think you'd be hard pressed to find landform-shaped puzzle pieces.

That makes sense to me.  A lot of the maps we're doing now don't have boundaries other than land/water (ie, labeling rivers, waterways, and a few landmarks near the Jamestown settlement); perhaps saving the coloring for when there are relevant political boundaries to mark would be good. 

Edited December 22, 2019 by serendipitous journey

[domestic_engineer]

Here's another idea .... what about putting tracing paper over the desired map and having your son trace the basics .... and then .... color it in.  That way he ends up with a creation of his own.  He might buy into it more if he's truly adding value to the his map (actually making the water colorful rather than changing the color from gray to blue).

 

[EKS]

I think it comes down to what your goals are.

If you are using coloring to develop fine motor skills, then he should color the landforms, but you should probably be enforcing neatness.  I've found that this is a great way to get a kid to hate maptime.

If you are interested in him learning where the landforms are in a rote way, there are lots of ways to do that, including just sitting with him and doing a bit of informal quizzing each day.  I've found that doing it this way is less painful for a coloring hater, but that it doesn't yield knowledge that is retained long term.

If you are interested in him learning where things are in a more meaningful way--as in, making sure there is history/narrative/science attached to his knowledge of the landforms--keep a map or two in the same area that you read aloud (assuming you do this) and when something geographic comes up, have him find it on the map (with clues, obviously).  Then, if appropriate, have him relate it to other things he has learned--rivers and civilization, mountains and plate tectonics, etc.  Note that learning geography this way is a years long process.

Edited December 22, 2019 by EKS

[Terabith]

On 12/21/2019 at 7:01 PM, Quercus said:

I think the idea is that coloring those things in helps them remember the boundaries, so they can better recognize them on sight. Puzzles with country-shaped pieces probably do the same thing, but I think you'd be hard pressed to find landform-shaped puzzle pieces.

Why not just get some Montessori maps?  Or GeoPuzzles?  I mean, coloring CAN help a kid remember boundaries, but if kiddo can do so without coloring, why force the issue of coloring?  When I student taught, I was told that the reason for making children color was LITERALLY to waste time.  It appalled me no end.  

ETA:  Sheppard's Software website has tons of map games that do a lovely job of teaching boundaries without coloring a whit.  It's one of my 16 year old's fondest memories of her earliest years in elementary school homeschooling, and she still has an amazing knowledge of geography.  Honestly, way better than mine, but it was one of the few websites she was allowed to independently navigate at age seven.  

Edited December 27, 2019 by Terabith

[domestic_engineer]

10 minutes ago, Terabith said:

[snip]... why force the issue of coloring?  When I student taught, I was told that the reason for making children color was LITERALLY to waste time.  ...

I knew it; I knew it; I knew it!!!!! 😄

In addition to Sheppard Software, Seterra is another great website ... not just to practice online, but I discovered you can also print blank maps in a variety of "quiz" formats.

[Quercus]

9 hours ago, Terabith said:

Why not just get some Montessori maps?  Or GeoPuzzles?  I mean, coloring CAN help a kid remember boundaries, but if kiddo can do so without coloring, why force the issue of coloring?  When I student taught, I was told that the reason for making children color was LITERALLY to waste time.  It appalled me no end.  

ETA:  Sheppard's Software website has tons of map games that do a lovely job of teaching boundaries without coloring a whit.  It's one of my 16 year old's fondest memories of her earliest years in elementary school homeschooling, and she still has an amazing knowledge of geography.  Honestly, way better than mine, but it was one of the few websites she was allowed to independently navigate at age seven.  

 

I do not believe I have advocated forcing children to color maps.

Coloring in general is good for building hand strength and coordination in young kids, so hopefully the people doing it in schools to waste time are at least conferring some benefit, even if they aren't aware of it. 

[Janeway]

I think coloring in helps remember where things are. BUT, I would just color in the blue for the water and leave it at that. It will help to really bring out the definition of the land vs the water.

[Terabith]

2 hours ago, Janeway said:

I think coloring in helps remember where things are. BUT, I would just color in the blue for the water and leave it at that. It will help to really bring out the definition of the land vs the water.

Most logic stage students are already pretty clear on the difference between land and water.  And I'm not saying there is no benefit to coloring.  Especially if a child chooses to do so, sure, it can have benefits.  But again, I think most of those benefits are in younger children, unless an older kid has fine motor difficulty of some sort.  My issue is that there are a zillion different ways to build hand strength and coordination, and ideally, kids would have a variety of choices in activities to work on those skills rather than just mandated coloring for huge quantities of time.  

[sweet2ndchance]

Coloring is not a hill I'm willing to die on. Some kids enjoy it and some kids just don't. It can be helpful for a lot of things but not if the child hates doing and actively resists doing it every time. If trying some alternative ways of coloring doesn't appeal to him, I would let it go honestly. I hated coloring maps as a kid, never made any of my kids color anything as I saw it as busywork and yet we are all very good with geography. I attribute our geography skills to always having maps of all kinds around. I even had a huge map under plexiglass on the dining room table for a long time. The kids most definitely could find any country or body of water in the world and recognize any of them by shape, no coloring required.

[ikslo]

My son hated to color.  Full stop.  It was a no-win battle.  So I got colored pencils and let him outline the shapes, crosshatch, use dots, etc like someone mentioned above, and battle axes were dropped and we got through it.  I let him pick his colors, even if that meant black and purple rather than green and blue.  He learned the material.  He has a much better grasp on geography than I did at his age.

[Arcadia]

For physical geography, I am more focused on:

1) learning to interpret a topological map when hiking (geocaching just adds the fun factor) because it’s a useful life skill

2) ability to draw a rough map when giving directions to someone (not everyone has cellphones with unlimited data plan) as that’s another useful life skill

Coloring is a skill but I rather focus on that skill in art than geography. Just like we focus on cursive in handwriting practice and not in essay writing (as long as essays are legible).

[Janeway]

4 hours ago, Terabith said:

Most logic stage students are already pretty clear on the difference between land and water.  And I'm not saying there is no benefit to coloring.  Especially if a child chooses to do so, sure, it can have benefits.  But again, I think most of those benefits are in younger children, unless an older kid has fine motor difficulty of some sort.  My issue is that there are a zillion different ways to build hand strength and coordination, and ideally, kids would have a variety of choices in activities to work on those skills rather than just mandated coloring for huge quantities of time.  

I did not mean for them to understand the difference of land and water. I meant for them to see the outlines. To help them picture the shapes better.

[serendipitous journey]

On 12/22/2019 at 7:20 AM, EKS said:

I think it comes down to what your goals are.

If you are using coloring to develop fine motor skills, then he should color the landforms, but you should probably be enforcing neatness.  I've found that this is a great way to get a kid to hate maptime.

If you are interested in him learning where the landforms are in a rote way, there are lots of ways to do that, including just sitting with him and doing a bit of informal quizzing each day.  I've found that doing it this way is less painful for a coloring hater, but that it doesn't yield knowledge that is retained long term.

If you are interested in him learning where things are in a more meaningful way--as in, making sure there is history/narrative/science attached to his knowledge of the landforms--keep a map or two in the same area that you read aloud (assuming you do this) and when something geographic comes up, have him find it on the map (with clues, obviously).  Then, if appropriate, have him relate it to other things he has learned--rivers and civilization, mountains and plate tectonics, etc.  Note that learning geography this way is a years long process.

This is the sort of things that works great when we do it, but I don't have the background I'd like to make it easy now that my eyes are having close-reading trouble.  Went to the optometrist today & have a new prescription: that, plus maybe keeping a magnifying glass next to the map and perhaps liberally sprinkling magnifying glasses on horizontal surfaces generally, ought to help 😉 . 

[serendipitous journey]

On 12/27/2019 at 4:59 AM, Quercus said:

...

Coloring in general is good for building hand strength and coordination in young kids, so hopefully the people doing it in schools to waste time are at least conferring some benefit, even if they aren't aware of it. 

I found this, too.  There are other ways to achieve similar benefits, but coloring is an efficient way to add fine motor strength & coordination activities across the curriculum, esp. for younger children who enjoy it. 

Edited December 29, 2019 by serendipitous journey

[serendipitous journey]

13 hours ago, Paradox5 said:

In a word: no. If he can label a blank map fine, skip the color battle. Use colored pen for the different place names, rivers, etc.

I 💕 this colored pen idea.  Would add an extra level of attention w/o requiring busy work, and has an actual benefit in that it would make the meanings of labels clearer -- a blue name would be a waterway, and a green name in the same region would be a landform label.  Cool!

[ieta_cassiopeia]

I would say that colouring in a map is optional, depending on your goal for doing it. Lots of people learn geography without colouring in a map, but visual learners can benefit from a brighter version of the initial illustration (especially if self-generated) and kinetic learners from the effort of keeping within the borders. (Those who already learned the boundaries from text, audio or from the original illustration can safely skip the colouring).

 

One idea you could try if you would like the maps to be coloured in, is to give your elder the choice - colour the whole thing in, or colour in just the edges of each item. Colouring the edges also helps with memorisation of the boundaries, just like colouring everything would, but may also test fine motor skill a bit more than colouring everything would (colouring everything gives the mind a moment's break when colouring the middle). This is viable in any situation where the key thing about what is to be coloured is its boundary.

 

I would be inclined to expect a reasonable degree of neatness, either way - the odd bit over the edge or some raggedness on the non-boundary side of the coloured edge ultimately won't matter, but you know your elder enough to know what he can reasonably do on a given day.

Paradox5's plan sounds good also 🙂

Edited December 31, 2019 by ieta_cassiopeia