A Continent Study of AFRICA for Kids

It’s a month of Africa Continent study in the house.  Mavi enjoyed learning about this beautiful continent, its geography, exploring the different places and landmarks, the wildlife and habitats and of course the different culture and traditions that make Africa unique!

Africa Continent Map and Location

Just like in any of our continent study, we always start with identifying the location of the continent.  Though Mavi is already familiar of the African continent, he still likes using our Montessori Continent Map, which I got from Tower High Learning.  I got it for a reasonable price and excellent in quality! You can also purchase this map in Amazon US. The cards that he is using are from my shop, "Montessori Animals of Africa 3 Part Cards with Fact Cards".

Plotting the animals on the continent map.  He loves doing this!  You can also check this other activity to see how we associated each animal to the continents using our animal continents activity sheets, Montessori Inspired Animal Continents Activity Sheets.

I am so pleased with the purchase of this world map puzzle. I got this for 50% off in a local bookshop.  We can work with individual continents or work with it entirely. For suggestions on map puzzles you can check my post: World Map Jigsaw Puzzle Recommendations.

Africa Continent Flags

We love working with pin maps!  This activity is for Mavi to familiarize with the different countries in the African continent and their flags. These Africa flags are made from toothpicks and the flag pack from my shop, "Flags of Africa".

We love LEGO and we use them in so many ways!  Here, I instructed Mavi to create the South African flag using his LEGO.  This is a similar activity with our Asian Study of flags.  After which, he worked on his African flags nomenclature cards.  Note that the picture card of the South African flag is in the wrong position, reason why I have to remind Mavi to be very careful in positioning flags because they might be interpreted in a wrong way.

He likes positioning his other “favorite” flags on the plate.

Africa Continent Landmarks

Of course, we made our pyramid version using LEGO.  This is what Mavi picked because it is easier to replicate. The cards in the picture below were printed from our landmarks printable, "Montessori Inspired Landmarks of Africa 3 Part Cards and Fact Cards" which you can buy from my shop.

Africa Continent Animals and their Habitats

This is by far Mavi’s favourite.  He’s not yet over with his animal toys and still loves playing with them.

First, learning about the different animals in Africa.  Mavi read the fact cards of my "Animals of Africa" and loves talking about them while he play pretends.

If you have a preschooler, it is best to have a matching game. Using the animal figures (these are Safari Toobs Wild), match each figure to the picture.

Or in case the figures are not available, you can still use the picture cards and their labels (3 part cards) for a 3 period lesson about African Animals.  Mavi still loves doing this even though he can easily read and finish the entire activity in a minute.

Another favorite activity is matching the animal skin covers! Wooohooo! Aren’t these cool? Mavi was so enthralled with this! Next time we study Africa, we’ll paint the patterns!  Your preschoolers will definitely enjoy this! These Africa animals skin cover cards are taken from my "Africa in a Nutshell" which you can also buy from my shop.  If you want to know more about the content of this Africa Continent Learning Pack I've discussed it in detail in this post, Africa in a Nutshell.

Again, if you don’t have animal figures, you can match the animal skin patterns with a picture of an animal, similar to the ones shown here.

And I asked Mavi to pick between a zebra and a giraffe, he wanted to work with the zebra… so here he is learning the parts of a zebra!  This will help the child familiarize with the different parts of the animal.  Another great thing about this activity for preschoolers is that it will enhance their reading skills. The 3-Part cards are also from my "Africa in a Nutshell" product.

And this is how we studied the habitats of Africa. Using our Animals of the World Habitats Learning Pack, we recreated the map of Africa with its biomes using Playdoh.  We also identified the animals that live in each habitat. We followed the color code of our map and cards.

Africa Continent Plants

We used our Plant Atlas file from my shop to learn about the plants that grow in Africa. We worked on the Control Chart as well, differentiating the plant life in each continent.

Africa Continent Language Study

Mavi worked on this briefly.  I printed this African proverbs from here and we used Montessori grammar symbols to identify the nouns, verbs, and adjectives in the phrases.  This is also a copy work in case you want your kids to practice writing.

Africa Continent Culture and Beliefs

I’ve been doing research about Africa and made Africa Continent fact cards (important) for Mavi to read and use. We did some of the activities in the cards, like creating African patterns (designs on textiles), researching about the ethnic tribes of Africa and enjoying the beaded bracelet that my friend gave me which resembles African jewelries.

I taught Mavi how to do research.  We did it using the internet as of the moment but I would like to bring him to the library and do it there as well.  We love our tablet and we use it in so many ways! He loves how this girl looks.

And he thinks it is cool to have a lip plate!

Africa Continent Natural Resources

We did this activity (Natural Resources and Their Products) last year but was not able to touch it because the boys got sick. I also have a product in my shop for this topic, "Natural Resources of the World".

Africa Continent Art

I purchased art lessons from Deep Space Sparkle and they were all amazing! This one is the Africa art lesson which comprises of learning how to make mud houses, giraffes, African patterns and creating your Maasai Tribe.  See how he applied the patterns on the body of the tribe?

Africa Continent Videos

We watched the entire series Africa (BBC TV series) on Netflix. The series was beautifully created and entertaining! It was breathtaking to see all those beautiful landscapes, different habitats, the richness of wildlife. Just WOW.  Watching this video made us want to jump right then and there in Africa! (And a friend also shared a video of Gambia). Thank you!

Africa Continent Songs

We listened to a few songs on YouTube and see how the people used some of the native instruments.

Africa Continent Stories

I borrowed this book (South and North, East and West: The Oxfam Book of Children's Stories) from the library and you can purchase them at Amazon [aff.link] as well.  They contain lots of beautiful African tales and stories.  Mavi reads them at night before going to bed.

Africa Continent History

And to complete our unit, we did an Ancient Egypt Study.  These figurines are from the Ancient Egypt Safari Toobs and they are awesome! Perfect for hands on learning!  Read more about it here.

Here’s a summary of the materials we used in this Continent unit:

• Flags of Africa
• Animals of Africa (3-Part Cards and Fact Sheets)
• Landmarks of Africa
• Africa Continent Geography Folder (Culture and Traditions)
• Africa in a Nutshell and the post describing its content in detail, link here.
• Animal Habitats
• African Art
• African Proverbs
• Safari Toobs Ancient Egypt
• Safari Toobs Wild

And that’s about it!!  I hope you can pick up a lot of ideas that you can do with your kids or in your school!  Don’t forget to visit us as well in our other social media sites for updates! Thank you!

This post is part of the 12 Months of Montessori Learning which is hosted by Natural Beach Living and The Natural Homeschool.

Amazing blogs involved in the 12 Months of Montessori Learning

Natural Beach Living ~ The Natural Homeschool ~ Living Montessori Now

The Kavanaugh Report ~ Mama's Happy Hive ~ Study at Home Mama ~ Child Led Life

Every Star Is Different ~ Grace and Green Pastures ~ The Pinay Homeschooler