Searching For Maps

I have spent hours sitting at my computer searching for maps I can quickly print off for my children.

I have downloaded software, sought, looked, and well…I gave up. Until I finally found what I had been looking for.

What I wanted was something that was easy, provided me with multiple views of a state, region or any portion of our beautiful earth, and that was also easy to format and print.

Sounds easy, right? Because in this world of technology you can find anything you want and you’re sure there’s an ‘app for that’ because if you don’t jump on it…it’s already been created and well…you know how that story goes.

But, back to my maps.

We are currently studying American History. I love American History and I love being able to show my children maps and details that help them actually visualize the places our ancestors landed, what their lives were like, and to understand the true diversity of our nation at that time.

It wasn’t as simple as a few families from England deciding to jump on the Mayflower and rush across the ocean and lead peaceful lives.

NO! There were families from other countries as well as the Native Americans. I think it’s so important to understand that when all of these people came together, there were challenges. However, they had one beautiful thing in mind – creating a nation built on unity of freedom and liberty.

With that in mind, we chased a rabbit one day (yes, we ran off of our curriculum path and decided to learn something that was not on the schedule – gasp!).

We wanted to know where people from different countries and ethnic groups decided to live. This was partly decided because we were talking about the Pilgrims and a few other people groups we were reading about. But, it was also spurred by our own family ancestry. My husband’s family recently immigrated to the states from Germany and Norway. His parents were truly first born in this nation. Yet my family has been here since the country was founded (though, we were not on the Mayflower).

That’s when I finally sat down with my husband and had him help me load WonderMaps onto our computer.

Once it was loaded, I spent the next hour in that giddy euphoria a homeschool mom experiences when she knows she has discovered a gold mine and the endless hours spent searching for something have come to an end.

I am so impressed with the multiple facets of WonderMaps! It is easy to navigate and use and now I can delete all the other software off of my computers. I can now easily find what I want either chronologically, historically, or geographically. Plus, I get decide what layers to add or subtract! Do I want it simple or complex? In color or black and white?

To say that I’m in love…may be an understatement…