A great way to incorporate a little math is a journey book or story. A great example is Journey to Jo’burg by Beverly Naidoo. A 13-year old boy and his sister must make a journey 300 kilometers from their small village to Johannesburg, South Africa to get medical help. How far is that…really? For you sharp GIS folks, it’s a quick little buffer activity in ArcGIS or AEJEE. You could use ArcGIS Explorer and measure that distance; however, if you only have the internet available to your classroom, our trusty tool Sketch-A-Map can give us some assistance here. As the teacher you will have to do some homework here to discover real distance. In the case of our story, Pietersburg, South Africa is approximately 300 kilometers from Johannesburg.
Now that we can see that journey on the map, let’s appreciate what Tiro and Naledi in the story did to get help. Time to do a little math!
If you’re just a little creative, you can continue to cover your required content and give students important connections to their curriculum! As an added bonus, the math teacher will be happy too!
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