Social Studies Actual Size Review

Full scale drawings of famous landmarks turn your driveway into a “landscape for learning!”  History books are filled with images of famous landmarks, but it is up to you, the reader, to image what it would be like to see these places up close.  Thanks to the drawings contained in Social Studies Actual Size it is now much easier to bring these iconic images to life.

 Social Studies Actual Size Review - EducationPossible.com

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Can you imagine crossing the ocean in a ship the size of the Mayflower?  How many people do you think would fit inside an Inuit Igloo?  How tall was the Statue of Zeus at Olympia?  Social Studies Actual Size has the answers to all of these questions, and many, many more!

 

This 90+ page guide includes 36 activities focused on high interest social studies topics.  Each activity includes:

Activity Page –

Social Studies Actual Size Review - EducationPossible.com
Activity Page –The is a one page overview of the topic and includes a list of materials needed to create the drawing, a little background information/interesting points about the topic and a few vocabulary words

Plan Page –

Social Studies Actual Size Review - EcucationPossible.com
Plan Page – A one page blueprint for the drawing, including measurements and a rough sketch of the original object.

Check out this extensive  list of the activities included in Social Studies Actual Size

  • The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World
    • The Lighthouse of Alexandria
    • The Colossus of Rhodes
    • The Mausoleum at Halicarnassus
    • The Statue of Zeus at Olympia
    • The Temple of Artemis at Ephesus
    • The Hanging Gardens of Babylon
    • The great Pyramid of Giza
  • The Old World
    • Stonehenge
    • The Parthenon
    • Roman Roads
    • The Roman Colosseum
    • The Great Wall of China
    • Viking Ship
    • A Castle from the Middle Ages (this is an awesome activity to add to your Medieval history study)
  • Native America
    • Native American Boats
    • Moai (Easter Island Statue)
    • Inuit Igloo
    • Iroquois Longhouse
    • Sioux Tipi
  • US History
    • Log Cabin
    • Conestoga Wagon
    • Prairie Schooner
    • Slave Cabin
    • One-Room Schoolhouse
  • Historic Transportation
    • The Santa Maria
    • The Mayflower
    • The Clermont
    • Locomotives, Then and Now
    • The Wright Flyer
  • Warfare
    • Range of Weapons
    • World War I Tranches
    • Modern Tanks
  • American Landmarks
    • The Alamo
    • The Statue of Liberty’s Torch
    • The Oval Office
    • Mount Rushmore

Our Experience

We decided to try our hand at “building” a Viking Ship since we had recently completed a unit on explorers.  For this drawing we needed the blueprint, sidewalk chalk and a tape measure.  It took us about a half hour to complete the drawing.  During the time we spent working on the drawing we discussed some of the interesting information we had learned about the Viking expeditions.  When the ship began to take shape, and my children realized how small it really was and how little room there was to move around, (image all of the other people and supplies onboard) they were amazed!

Since we love hands-on activities we really enjoyed using these blueprints to create life-sized drawings of objects we had read about in books.  Not only did this help my visual learner understand and appreciate the size and shape of items, it also gave my kinesthetic learner an opportunity to measure and draw and then pretend he was on an actual Viking ship!

Social Studies Actual Size Review EducationPossible.com

Uses

This is a product I would keep in our homeschool library for many years.  The activity pages are quite basic therefore they are not really intended as stand-alone lesson plans.  Rather, these drawings would perfect to supplement just about any history curriculum – when you talk about one of the topics during your history lessons you could use these drawing for a supplemental activity.  Young children may need a little help with a few of the more complex drawings, but these would be appropriate for use by elementary through high school aged students.

I also believe these would be very useful in a co-op setting.  Children could work together the read the blueprints and create a drawing, then they could use the completed drawing to act out a historical event, discuss the actual materials and building processes used for the original item, etc.

Which of these historic landmarks would your family most like to bring to life with Social Studies Actual Size?

 

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