More than just labeling

[Angela Chong]

Something else I often forget to include is the mercator projection distortion. Discussion of the impression that those places further from the equater are larger than they are often give residents of those places a distorted perspective of significance in relation to the rest of the world. Including the pictures from last week showing relative land mass of areas of East Asia to places in the United States would provide an extension of those comparisons. As a high school teacher I forget that it's been a while since maps were discussed and often Social Studies gets pushed aside in elementary school when there is such importance placed on Language Arts and Math. During class the comparison of East Asia population to land area compared to places in the United States would also be helpful for students to understand that smaller land area doesn't necessarily mean less population. Again the 6 to 8 people on a newspaper comes to mind. Anything to help them see the world from a perspective other than their own. To understand that the way they experience the world is different from the way others live.