Tuesday, December 05, 2006

How do you explain 'south' to a four year old?

S. wanted to know where north and south were during dinner the other night. After trying to explain it to her multiple times (complete with how if you go far enough north, you wind up going south again) I brought in the big guns. S., L. and I sat on the living room floor with my historical globe (purchased back when I was gunning to be a Social Studies teacher). We found our general vicinity, the north pole and the south pole. We talked about how you are going north if you are going toward the north pole, and you are going south if you are going toward the south pole. We traced Magellan's route all the way around the world. We followed Christopher Columbus' journey across the Atlantic. We looked at all the different labels printed on the globe while I explained that no, those were not islands, they were just information about the makers of the globe.

I had fun and briefly considered pursuing a teaching career after all. Nah...

M.W.

1 comment:

Gretchen said...

Good idea!

I'm still trying to get the hang of "left" and "right" when an unnamed husband calls out directions when I'm driving...