What is a Map?

(Grades 1-2)

This program teaches students how to interpret maps by encouraging them to read the stories being told by mapmakers.

People Shape the Earth & the Earth Shapes People

(Grades 2-5)

After an introductory lesson on maps and mapping, students work together to consider our relationships to the environment by examining regional maps of the United States.

Mapping America - (Grade 3-8)

Students learn the basics of mapmaking and the many ways maps tell stories before breaking into small groups to explore a range of maps of the United States, from some of the oldest in our collection to the present. Possible themes: 1) how regional maps tell stories about the expansion of the US or 2) how thematic maps reveal a mapmaker’s purpose.

Kids Count!: Mapping Children in Boston

(Grades 3-8)

Students explore different ways cartographers have represented the presence of children in Boston for different purposes. Along the way they learn about geospatial data and GIS (geographic information systems), the power of symbology, and the importance of considering a mapmaker’s purpose. They also try their hand at geospatial data visualization.

World Maps Over Time (Grade 6-8)

Students practice being critical map readers using a range of world maps, from the oldest in our collection to the present. After an interactive lesson on map projections, students work in small groups to analyze what mapmakers include on their maps and why.

Native People and Settler Colonialism--A Story of Land and Maps

(Grade 4-12)

Students learn the basics of mapmaking and explore maps made by Indigenous and Euro-American cartographers to uncover Native presence and the dispossession of Native lands.

Boston Over Time

Grades 5-12

In this program, students use maps to discover how Boston’s landscape has been transformed over the course of its history. In a hands-on activity, students will examine maps spanning the past four hundred years to better understand how Boston has changed in tandem with its population and industry.

Mapping the American Revolution (Grade 3, 5 and 8-12)

Students will investigate the struggle for control of New England by using period maps to uncover information about the historical actors in the Revolution, the significance of geography, and the motives of the mapmakers.