Contemporary Cartography for Children in Bulgaria

The paper presents a project on the use of maps in the kindergarten. Twenty-four children (4 to 6 years old) from three nursery schools in a rural area in central Greece participated in the program, which aimed at initiating them into the cartographic knowledge through the understanding and production of maps. Furthermore, the project aimed to promote the children’s decoding skills in order for them to develop visual literacy which appears to be a necessity in today’s pictorial world. Data about the preschoolers’ cartographic knowledge prior to the program was gathered through personal interviews based on a semi-structured questionnaire. The same method was used for the final assessment of the program. Discourse analysis was conducted using electronic data gathered from the questionnaire in order to explore the children’s comprehension of maps prior to and after the completion of the program. Additionally, the entire procedure was evaluated by appropriately designed observation sheets. A variety of activities with electronic and printed maps was designed to help the children reorganize their beliefs and expand their ideas and representations about maps as a means of communication. They were trained in the proper use of maps, meaning that they were familiarized with reading and interpreting visual information presented in symbolic form on maps. The project was integrated into the weekly program of the kindergartens for a four month period and was implemented by cross-thematic, collaborative activities of a constructivist approach. The results indicate that maps should be incorporated into the early childhood curriculum as a source of visual information and that preschool children are capable of reading and producing maps provided that they have been adequately trained in their use.

2005

In the New Zealand National Curriculum maps are defined as an essential skill along with graphs and tables. Despite the widespread use of maps in everyday life and their incorporation in more than one area of the curriculum there has been little research in New Zealand on children’s knowledge of maps, their use and where and how children encounter them. The research reported in this thesis is an attempt to broaden our understanding of young school children’s knowledge of maps and in particular the sources of their map knowledge in family, neighbourhood and school. The study was informed by two bodies of work, that of Fay Panckhurst on preschoolers’ map knowledge and its sources, and the NEMP studies which assessed graphs, tables and maps at Years 4 and 8. From a Decile 2 school, a sample of Year 3 & 4 children was selected before they had been introduced to maps at school. The students were interviews individually. Each was asked to select the maps from a collection, which included ...

2024

Cartography, serving as a medium of interpretation and visualization, assumes a vital role as a mechanism for proficient communication. Its prevalent utilization is notably evident within the educational sphere, predominantly in primary educational institutions such as schools. The visual portrayal facilitated by maps enables young learners to assimilate knowledge and cultivate proficiencies related to their immediate surroundings and spatial cognition. The creation and formulation of such maps demand meticulous scrutiny and contemplation of a myriad of factors that wield influence over children, encompassing facets pertinent to their cognitive maturation and development. Within the context of this research, a comprehensive set of 16 maps were curated and devised. Among these, 8 maps constitute the primary category, encompassing the political map delineating municipalities, the administrative map showcasing cities, the regions map, the physical geographical map, the tourism and economy map, the agriculture map, the farming map, and the climate map. The remaining 8 maps belong and focus on tourism and economy, with particular emphasis placed on each of the 8 regions comprising the Republic of North Macedonia. These maps were carried out as part of the realization of the "Atlas of North Macedonia for primary school pupils" project. This atlas has been compiled and designed for pupils aged 6 to 10.

The Barbara Petchenik Competition is organized all over the world and also in Hungary since 1993. This paper intends to present a selection of maps sent to the Hungarian competition in this period (14 years), including not only the winner maps but also other entries not forwarded to the International final contest. The diversity in the ways used by children to draw our world and to represent the selected theme motivated the author to present the drawings together, trying to systematize the multiple solutions characterized by the peculiar and rich imagination of children and young people. The traditional age groups let us follow the development of the children's drawing abilities, but it can not be the only one point of view to analyze and classify their maps. Different factors have been taken in consideration during the systematization of these (art)works, beginning from the shape and extent of the drawn continents to the applied artistic solutions to express thematic information and the variety of materials used to express specific ideas related to their own concepts about the world.

South Florida Journal of Development, 2021

This work aims to show the feasibility of introducing basic cartographic concepts in the first year of high school, with simple resources, contributing to the process of knowledge construction by the young person himself by stimulating his curiosity. For this, a theoretical study was made on the theme presented here, then activities were given in the classroom and, later, the diagnosis and debate of the results obtained were carried out. Cartographic literacy, demonstrated in these activities, predisposes the student to work his competence in this form of language, qualifying him/her to make multiple readings of the world through the most disparate cartographic representations possible. Thus, after the didactic sequence used in mediation with the students, in addition to encouraging the reading of maps, the subjects also had the opportunity to create their own fantasy maps. The work was based on David Ausubel's Theory of Significant Learning and the parameters present also in Lev Vygotsky's Historical-Cultural Theory and Henri Wallon's Theory of Development were also used.

2005

Cartographic research has reported that early elementary school children have shown advanced mapping behaviors in reading positional, locational and wayfinding information using large scale maps. More recent studies revealed that Grade 2 students understand the map as a representation of space and can be exposed to more advanced cartographic means, such as thematic maps. The idea of designing thematic maps and using them as teaching aids, even in early school years, sounds interesting and challenging. But, are the cartographers ready to design such maps? Do they know young children's needs, attitudes, and more over, their feelings about mapping? We believe that cartographers have to follow careful steps before designing maps for children of such a young age, since these maps will introduce these children to mapping activities and probably affect their future attitudes towards maps. Among the very first concerns of the map designer must be the method used to symbolize geographica...

International Journal of Cartography

enfants. Ce sont ces cartes à l'échelle locale et nationale qui aiguisent leur sens d'une appartenance locale et d'une identité nationale. En s'appuyant sur ces contextes, douze objectifs ont été identifiés pour l'apprentissage des cartes en primaire.

COMMUNICATION AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY IN SOCIETY. VOL. 3 SOCIAL COMMUNICATION, 2015

Cartographic compilations, in the form of maps and atlases, are one of the forms facilitating commu− nication in a teacher−student relationship in the process of knowledge transfer, especially in the field of geography and history. Spatial information referring to objects, phenomena and events, both nat− ural and socio−economic,occurring today and in the past, is represented on maps in the form of car− tographic signs. After meeting certain conditions geographical and historical maps are an effective communication instrument. These conditions include the conformity of the map content with the curriculum and information capacity of a scale (in which the map is presented) and the elaboration of map graphic in accordance with cartographic semiotics principles. Both conditions – the first one related to the map content and the second related to the graphics – are closely related to the char− acteristics of the user, who, depending on the age, may have different perception and experience. This applies mainly to the recipient of school maps. Separate requirements are imposed by students with vision defects (partially blind or blind). In the first stage of teaching both geography and history, in the process of communication between the map and the student, it is a teacher who plays a key role. He is considered to be the one who teaches how to interpret the map by discussing and ex− plaining its content. However, at the high school level, communicationin school−student relationship no longer requires the participation of the teacher; the map takes a direct dimension.

The author presents criteria of evaluation and assumption for early school education maps. Attention was payed to needs and perceptual possibilities of map users and cartographic correctness of maps. Main criteria of map evaluation – content and form of a map – have their unique attributes. In case of the first criterion they are accuracy and remaining up-to-date, classification of content and usability. Second criterion consist of: composition, colours, labels on the map and readability. Materials commissioned by Ministry of National Education were evaluated on the said criteria basis. Evaluation of maps for early school education revealed their flaws, among which absence of a scale can be named. Afterwards assumptions were developed and used to prepare own proposal of a map. Achieving maximum readability was a priority. Other assumptions concerned graphic balance, classification and hierarchy of content, simplicity of elaboration, usage of readable typefaces and adjustment of transmission to the age of users.