Activity: Name The Country

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Social Media is great for sharing ideas and practice, being one of the main reasons why UKEdChat started in the first place. Ideas, discussions and resources (and some irritating SPAM) often flow through the hash tag with great inspirational teaching ideas catching your eye.

One such idea was spotted, having been shared by Rang Bianca who has used the word cloud website Tagxedo to add class pupils names into an Africa shape, and then challenging the students (aged 9/10) to estimate which country/ies their name is in – clearly, this could be adapted to: European countries; Counties in England etc; States in the USA / Australia etc; Asian countries; and so on. Challenge pupils to estimate, then check their answers using technology, or an atlas/globe.

The site is one of our favourite word cloud creators, allowing flexibility, customisation and easy saving/sharing of the final image. You can read more about Rang Bianca’s class via their class page at https://t.co/EI15pgt6qB

How to:

1. Go to the Tagxedo website, and click the ‘Create’ button.
2. Add your text (pupil’s names) by clicking ‘Load’ – You can type in, or copy/paste from another document, then click ‘Submit’
3. Click the arrow next to ‘Shape’ – As you scroll, you will see quite a few maps already within the program. If the country/continent you want is already there, then click; allow to load; and close the shape box (x). If the country/continent that you require is not there, then you will need to source/download an image then clicking ‘Add Image’ at the bottom, and adjusting the controls once uploaded.
4. You can adjust the colours/themes of the image by selecting any of the options on the left.
5. Save your image – possible in high quality JPG or PNG formats. Another option at the top is to print, but you will need a connected printer to do this.
6. Create an answer sheet for pupils to complete.

How other teachers have used this idea:

It’s great to see that other teachers are taking this idea, amending and implementing for their pupils. Please let us know how this works in your classroom, so we can update and feature here:

• Sway Grantham ?@SwayGrantham added an image on her class blog, asking pupils to complete the task at home, replying on the blog. Click here to visit the blog.

• Primary Ideas added a map in the classroom for an activity during the school day, inserting a map of Europe to challenge the pupils.

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