Before we start this series of discussions we should take a look around us and see who is here in our global class. Please pass the 'attendance sheet' and sign your name and global address. Pardon? You don't know your global address? Hmmm... that's something we might all need to know in case we get lost in the dark! You never know...

One of the most exciting features of our online community is the fact that we come from all over the globe. Join us as we spend the next two weeks finding each other on the map and talking about the places where we live, go to school and have fun everyday. We'll try to discover how people shape their landscapes and are shaped by them.

You will find many questions here for you to answer. Don't forget to ask your online friends some questions that you might have for them. This is how we learn, by asking questions.

Discussion Questions

1. Introduce your class or group to those who are participating in our project. Include your school or group name, number of students, your town, village or city and country. Find your latitude and longitude and GMT factor as well. There are resources to help you on our Resources page.
2. You and your friends have very unique personalities. What do you think you have in common and how do you differ? Do you think that you are shaped by your place on earth, the surroundings you live in, your country, music, what is popular? What shapes you and your friends as you are? Do your friends help shape who you are? Do your heroes shape you?
3. Do you think places have personalities? How would you describe the place where you live by its personality?
4. When did people first move to your part of the world? Do you know who it was, why they came and how they founded your area?
5. Describe the physical characteristics of your area. What is the soil like? Do you have mountains or do you live in the plains? Is your town, village or city built around a river? Is it warm or cold where you live? Do you have four seasons? Do your hours of daylight vary drastically according to the season?
6. Do you think that homes are built the same all over the world? If not, how might they differ? What kinds of building materials are found in homes in your area?
7. What is your favorite room in your home? Describe it for us.
8. How do the physical characteristics of a place affect the people who live there?
9. Does the amount of sunlight during the day affect our recreational activities? How does it affect you?
10. People can shape their landscapes. Do you think people can be shaped by their landscapes as well?. How do you think this happens?
11. How do people change their environment to accommodate their needs?
12. Does your city or country grow all the food that you need or is food imported?
13. Is your country an important provider of food for to another country?
14. Are there famous natural landmarks in your area? Describe them and tell how they contribute to the personality of the place where you live.
15. In your country would visitors find volcanoes, waterfalls, glaciers, castles, mountains or deserts? Describe them for us.
16. Do the buildings in your area reflect the temperature or landforms? What kinds of materials are used for buildings where you live? Why are these materials used and not others?
17. Is transportation in your area affected by your landscape? What kinds of transportation do you have?
18. Are there historical places of interest near the place where you live? Describe them and tell why they are important to the history of your area.
19. Are there famous heroes from your area? Tell us who they are and why they are admired. Who is your hero? What does it mean to be a hero?
20. In your town is there a recreational or resort place of interest? How does it affect the economy of your town?
21. Do you have museums or other exhibits for all to enjoy such as an aquarium? What kinds of museums do you have? If you have an aquarium what kinds of animals would we find there?
22. What are the sights, sounds and smells of your neighborhood?
23. What do you like best about your area?

Activities

1. Work with your teacher and divide your class into groups to find the latitude and longitude for your location. Some of you will use atlases and maps while others will use electronic media to do this. Compare your results. Are they close? Which do you think is more accurate? Who was able to find the coordinates faster, those using paper sources or digital sources? Place a marker on the map to identify the places where your online friends live.
2. Keep a record for these two weeks of the daily low and high temperatures as well as the sunrise and sunset. Compare results with other goups in our project.
3. As a group or individually write a descriptive essay about a special place in your area that has meaning for you. In your essay, be sure to tell why this place is important to you. When you write, list specific details using adjectives, nouns and verbs to describe the sights, sounds, and smells of the location. You might want to take a pad and pen and visit the place so that you can better express your ideas.
4. Write an essay about a place where you have traveled, or about a place where people most often go. Why do you think they go there? Where is your favorite place to visit? Think about the unique qualities of this place and write about them in your essay.
5. Plan a website or display board with your teacher about your school, town or country.
6. Maps give us opportunities to show information about something. You could make a map of the world showing continents and outlines of countries. You could also make a map of your town, school or even your room! For this project make a map of your area. Include research as you create your map and list your sources. Give a presentation of your map to your class.Use color or shading to show any of the following:
   • land forms
   • vegetation
   • weather
   • roads, railroads, trails
   • important buildings or landmarks.
7. Create a timeline with your online friends and identify important events that happened in your countries. Select at least 4 important things that happened and put it on the line. Select one as old as you can possibly find, one or two important and one or two close in time.
8. Connect to the KidSpace and look at some of the personal spaces other kids have created. Compare them with some of your own special places.