Africa

The idea for this one came from Einstein E and Power P- my two kids. One day I picked them up from kindergarten, and they started telling me how Africa was their favourite continent, and that they wanted to do a project about it. So, we did it. And we learned some interesting facts about Africa:

  • African continent is the world’s oldest populated area.
  • Almost 40% of adults in Africa are illiterate – two-thirds are women. (This is a great opportunity to discuss these kinds of world problems with slightly older children.)
  • There are 54 countries in Africa. (Yes, this fact actually motivated Einstein E and Power P to start counting to 54. In both German and Croatian.)
How we made our little Africa:

Materials: 
-    World map, atlas or globe
-    Cardboard
-    Paint (we used regular watercolours and crayons)
-    Paintbrush
-    Pictures of animals living in Africa
-    Animal toys 

Step 1.
Talk about continents, look for them on a world map or a globe. We found this fantastic atlas of the world for kids at one flea market and got it for 2E.
So, we found Africa, named different animals that live there (also great for developing speaking and reading skills), the Sahara, introduced some big numbers (there are 54 countries in Africa), and remembered that the river Nile is the longest river in the world (6,852metres).

Step 2.
Preparation. What colours do we need? What colour is the desert in Africa? Why is it yellow? What about the river Nile? Is there a rainforest in Africa? What colour is the rainforest? I outlined the continent on a big piece of cardboard and roughly marked the most important areas. My geography teacher would be so proud. 

Step 3.
Painting. Don`t forget to protect the kid`s clothes or let them wear something old. We used the map of Africa to get the colours right for each part of the continent.



Step 4. 
Animals. We found pictures of the most common animals in Africa and printed them out. 
Then they did some cutting and glueing. We decided to focus on: African elephants, giraffes, zebras, African wild dogs, hippos, crocodiles, hyenas, some monkeys, and the fastest mammal, the cheetah, which can run with speeds up to 113km/hour! We also learned that lions are not “kings of the jungle” because they don`t live in the jungle. Their real habitat is the open savanna.

Step 5. 
Display. It is important to show children that their work is something they should be proud of. 
  


Step 6.
Play. Whenever my kids wanted to play Africa, they simply took the cardboard down, grabbed some animals and let their imagination do the rest.

There are more similar geography projects here. Such a great way for children (and grown-ups) to learn something new.