Hand-Drawn Maps: Creating Coral Reef Formations with Rice

In this post, I’m excited to share a fun way for kids to create their own hands-on maps using rice. This simple activity can help students learn about different landforms by providing a fun sensory experience.

While studying the Caribbean as part of our North America continent study, we also spent some time learning about coral reefs. One of my children’s favorite activities involved creating maps illustrating the different types of coral reef formations using rice to get them started. By molding and arranging rice to mimic fringing reefs, barrier reefs, and atolls, they were able to explore some of the differences between them. This hands-on project made learning about coral reefs much more memorable—and fun!

Of course, you can take this same map-making approach and apply it to a wide range of landform map activities. When students are happy with their rice formations, they can simply trace around the outlines to create their maps instead of drawing from scratch. Once they’ve drawn their landforms, they can add some color and additional details if they wish.

Using rice to create maps is a simple way to make more traditional mapmaking into an interactive experience where children can shape, trace, and explore landforms in a tactile way.

Step 1: Provide students with a small bowl of rice, plus reference images of the landforms they’ll be creating.

Step 2: Using their hands, students will move the rice around to create a landform shape using the rice. Here, my kids were creating the three main types of coral reef formations: fringe, barrier, and atoll.

Step 3: Next, students will use a pencil to trace around the outside of the rice form.

Step 4: Now it’s time to add some color! Students may wish to use colored pencils, crayons, or paint to finish their landform maps.

Creating hand-drawn maps with rice is a really simple yet impactful way to make geography more fun and engaging for kids. By shaping, tracing, and adding their own creative touches, children will gain a hands-on understanding of the differences between landforms and have lots of fun along the way!