Virginia SOL WG.7.a

Social Studies8th GradeClassifying and Identifying Regions

The Standard

identifying and analyzing the location of major geographic regions and major cities on maps and globes

Virginia Standards of Learning for History and Social Science · The student will analyze the characteristics of the regions of sub-Saharan Africa by

Teacher's field guide

What Students Need to Do: Students locate West, Central, East, and Southern Africa, plus major cities such as Lagos, Nairobi, and Johannesburg. They describe each location using direction, coastlines, the equator, and the Sahara.
What Mastery Looks Like: Students accurately label the regions and cities on an unlabeled map. They can compare locations, such as explaining that Lagos is west of Nairobi and Johannesburg is in Southern Africa.
Common Misconceptions: Students may think sub-Saharan Africa means south of the equator rather than south of the Sahara. They may confuse Southern Africa with South Africa or mistake cities for countries.
How to Assess It: Give students a blank map and ask them to label the four regions, Lagos, Nairobi, and Johannesburg. Require one sentence comparing two city locations.

Lesson moves

Give pairs a laminated outline map, region labels, and city cards to place, check, and correct using an atlas.
Ask students to explain how the Sahara, equator, and oceans help them describe the location of two cities.
Run a map relay where teams place Lagos, Nairobi, Johannesburg, and four region labels on a wall map.
Have students plan a flight from Lagos to Nairobi to Johannesburg and describe the direction and region of each stop.

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A ready-to-print activity worksheet aligned to WG.7.a, with an answer key for the teacher on its own page. No account needed.

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