Our Amusing Parks

Group Research and Models

Learning about the five themes of geography just got real for 6th grade students at Tidwell Middle school. These students didn't just memorize the five themes, they explored them by creating their own amusement park! Mrs. Neiswender and Mrs. Valentine encouraged their students to work in groups and collaborate together on the presentation, commercial, and ad for their park. Each group was asked to describe the relative and absolute location of their park, justify their location, explain the geographical factors, and identify ways that the new park will modify the physical environment.

Brooke, Lilly, and Caroline came up with an especially unique idea. "We choose to build our theme park in Nashville, so that we could have a music theme," stated Lilly. "Since Nashville is a music city, we named our rides examples such as "The Jazzy Jungle" and "The Elvis Express."

This group explained that Nashville was a town of tourists, which would be good for business. They also wanted to incorporate an educational theme through music, so that visitors could learn about different time periods and styles as they experienced the rides. By looking at Google Maps and doing some research, the group found that they would need to clear an area for the park. They woud not have to cut down many trees since they were already in a trafficed area. The group writes,"We are planning to build our theme park next to Nissan Stadium behind the Cumberland Park. Nashville is also known for having the second largest landmass in the nation." Doing research about real locations and getting to choose their location made this project relevant.

According to Brooke, "The most difficult part of this project was not using word or power point."  We ended up using Google Slides and found that it was similar to power point, but allowed us to all work from home together. This was good becuase we messed up several times in class and were able to work on it together from home." Caroline added, "I enjoyed trying something new. Next project I would like to try something else so that I know other ways to catch my audience's attention." This was a big project and the team learned that even though there were several of them on their team, they had to use time effectively to get everything done. "We all had good ideas, but we had to decide on the best ideas and then split up work or we would not have finished."

Brooke, Lilly, and Caroline's Presentation:
Music Around the World