Today, I’d like to share, My Map Book by Sara Fanelli. I picked it up years ago. While it’s not a book that you sit down and read together, it’s a book that you sit down and do together. It sparks wonderful ideas for mapping, story telling or writing, conversation or for art making.
Here are two sample spreads: Map of a beach, Map of my room.
I’ve used this book at home and in schools. When I taught 2nd Grade English, I used it to have the class map a new Season (That’s right, like Winter on their lawn or park. Just look at The Snowy Day (click here) to notice the infinite details of a snowy, Winter, day.). I know our kids have mapped their rooms, places and paging through it today, thought of what a fun project: mapping your face could be, with small kids or in combination with a writing project for bigger kids.
Above, our 8 year old son, began mapping our Mother-Son weekend trip as we took off. I asked him to Map traveling from Point A (Sweden) to Point B (London). The next step was to break it down by 1) having him map how we got from our house to the airport and then 2) from the airport to our Hotel in London. He’s not finished yet but, it will be a fun, small, project to tie up this week and to then have as a memory of our week.
Don’t get me wrong I’m capable of putting my feet up and relaxing but, as we set out to travel together, starting this map project was a great way to spark conversations and talk about our shared days ahead. Without pressure, he added to it (or I did, too when some days were just too full) by keeping a daily list of the things we did and enthusiastically collecting tickets, show, exhibit, and restaurant stubs which will be used to complete the pages as a collage. It’s a nice record of a wonderful weekend and a great way to keep some of these shared events vibrant.
Whatever your motivation be: keeping the kids off their electronics, encouraging writing skills, encouraging communication and conversation, creativity, journaling, or just as a way to keep your kids busy; I love journals and think this map book is a real mind spark for looking at maps and new places in a creative way. I hope you find it interesting, too!
Happy Mapping. I’d love to hear if you’ve heard of this book before or if you’ve ever mapped in a similar way? Do you find it too abstract and prefer traditional mapping? I’d love to hear from you.
Something you might like:
Favorite Book: Maps (not pictured below)
