Pirate Skills Lesson Plan
Navigation and Geography for Pirates in Training
Welcome to the fourth of our lesson plans on pirates!
Pirates were good sailors. They had to be to navigate the seas. So no pirate worth his salt would be without basic navigation skills. These are pretty important to landlubbers, as well!
- Learn or review basic directions, north, south, east, west.
- Learn or review global landmarks: hemispheres, continents, equator, Prime Meridian, lines of latitude and longitude, major oceans.
- Map skills - use any map you have at home. Find and identify the compass rose and the map key.
- Use a map - This can vary according to your child's age. For young children, make a map of your home or neighborhood. Walk around and observe locations of things, and make a simple map. For older children, find a local map. Map out a route you commonly use - to the grocery store, bank, church, a friend's house. Identify directions you would travel (such as, "we take Forest Dr. east to Conner. Street. then, we turn north", etc...) For even older children, have them map out a route for you to take to the grocery store. Then, get in the car and let them navigate. Go the direction they tell you (ex. "Take Oak Avenue south, Mom"). See where you end up!
- Guess the shape - Play a navigation game. You will give your child a set of directions that will have them walking a shape. Use a piece of masking tape on the floor for a starting point. Have your child stand on the tape, then say, for example, "Walk 5 paces north, 5 paces east, 5 paces, south, then 5 paces west." Have them guess the shape they walked in (square!). You can do this with a variety of shapes. Use challenging directions, like northeast, as well for shapes like the triangle.
- Learn to use a compass - If you have a compass around, get it out and learn how to use it. Kjetil Kjernsmo's guide to how to use a compass is a good introduction. Scroll down the page and find the lesson plan on "The Compass Alone".
- National Geographic Xpeditions is one of the best, free sites for a variety of geography lessons for all grade levels. You can also view and print out maps here.
Have fun, mateys!
The copyright of the article Pirate Skills Lesson Plan in Homeschooling is owned by Christine Alcott. Permission to republish Pirate Skills Lesson Plan must be granted by the author in writing.
