Washington D.C. Map Project
Materials /
  • Aerial photo of the Washington mall printed out from the App. Google Earth orGoogle maps web site.
  • Tracing or printer paper.
  • Ruler
  • Compass heading from web site.
  • Colored pencils
  • Tape (preferably transparent)
  • Scissors
  • Rulers

  1. Spend some time exploring the aerial photo of D.C. on Google Earth or Google maps.
  2. Find these locations on your map: The Lincoln Memorial and The U.S. Capitol are the east, west boundaries. Use the White House and The Jefferson Memorial as north, south boundaries for the rectangular map. (Should be printed in landscape format.)
  • You will need to include 10 places you have visited on the trip. Besides the ones listed above as boundaries, landmarks will be visible in the mapped area. Washington Monument, Viet Nam Memorial, American History and Natural Science Museums, M.L. King Memorial, FDR Memorial and the Korean War and WWII Memorials and many others.
  • Maps, are not photographs and you should never see the side of a building in a map so just give the shape of the building or memorial as a rectangle, circle or whatever is appropriate.(Do not just print and color the aerial photograph)
  1. Place paper on top of image. Carefully line up the tops of the two pieces of paper with the photograph on bottom.
  2. Tape two sheets to a window when the sun is shinning through the window or a glass top table with a bright light below it.
  3. Trace the outline of the image onto the paper. This way, you can always align the tracing paper with the image in case your tape slips.
  4. Begin by tracing the tops of buildings. Only trace the tops and not the sides because maps are what the world would look like if you were looking down from directly above it.
  5. Color the buildings in a certain color.
  6. Trace the outline of any grass areas like the mall. Color them green and areas with trees a darker shade of green.
  7. Trace other features that you see on the mall like sidewalks, water features such as the reflecting pool and the center of the WWII memorial and the Tidal Basin. Usingblue for water and different colors for sidewalks and roads. You need not include all roads or sidewalks just the major roads.
  8. Every map has a legend -- this is the part of the map where you explain what each color means. For example, if you used green to indicate the color of grassy areas, draw a small green square at the bottom of your map and put the word "grass" next to the square.
  9. Every map should indicate which way is north. Washington D.C. is laid out with the Washington Monument (West) and the Capitol Building to the East. Draw a compass rose on your map to indicate N-S-E-W.

Map Scale:

  1. Every map also has a scale bar. While digital data downloaded from the National map include information about the scale of the photograph, there is an easy and reliable way to determine the scale of the map using tools on Google Earth.
  2. This feature will be demonstrated in science class.
  3. You may print and tape the scale on the map or draw it with a ruler.
  4. To make the scale bar on your map, you will need to calculate the scale ratio.
  5. Use proportions to determine map scale, i.e. 3inches = 1 mile (5280ft.) then 1 inch = 1760 feet.(this will not be the scale for the D.C. map)