Children’s Navigational Map Reading Strategies and Implications for Educational Geogames

Bistron, Janina; Schwering, Angela; Özkaya, Ilhan Talha; Qamaz, Yousef

Abstract

Researchers emphasize the need for a deeper understanding of children’s navigational map reading and an emerging interest in digital geogames for educational purposes. However, there are only a few related studies. We conducted a navigational map reading study with children aged 6 to 13. The children were asked to navigate to a destination within a virtual environment by using a map and to explain their procedures thinking aloud. Some children described how they recognized the destination from its nearer environment, whereas others described their route and stopover locations towards the destination. Based on the children’s statements, we formulated educational implications for geogame features with the potential to represent successful navigational map reading strategies for training purposes.