Teaching Kids Art Through Picture Books

There I was, sitting in our new 1985 Nissan Sentra, aged 22 and married all of twenty-four hours. I was full of optimism and giddy enthusiasm. Mike was driving, and I held the map. Full of complicated folds and teeny tiny lines, it was a puzzle to figure out. Thankfully, I could do it-because somewhere along the line, I’d learned to read a map. We made it all the way to our North Carolina honeymoon, and thirty-eight years later, I still get excited about road trips with my husband-- and reading maps.

You never know when maps will come in handy on an adventure, so it’s important to help your kids learn how to read them. Besides that, maps can aid kids in developing a mental picture of their place in the world, be it in their home, church, city, or country.

Today’s picture book about maps, Footsteps on the Map, by Barbara Kerley, illustrated by Osaka Drachkovska, is interesting because it tells of two kids starting at different places and meeting in the middle.

That’s a fun concep...

My husband and I love to watch Amazing Race, where people travel all over the world completing challenges. We always feel frustrated (along with the competitors!) when they get hopelessly lost on the way to their next destination.  I actually have a terrible sense of direction, but I was taught to read a map, so I feel somewhat more secure when I have one in my hand and find myself wandering around in a new city. 

Is it even important for kids to learn to read maps anymore? Why teach your kids to read maps when they’ll have smart phones with GPS to do it for them?

It’s important for them to know how to read a map because obviously, technology sometimes fails us. We hit a “dead” spot or our phone dies.

If you know how to follow a map, you have a picture of where you are and how to get to your destination.

If you know how to follow a map, you know what the GPS means.

If you know how to follow a map, you can lead others and help them where they need to go.

According to PBS Kids, “T...