Key Stage 2 geography · Locational knowledge

KS2 North America: countries, cities and features

In Key Stage 2, children learn to locate the countries of North America on maps and globes and to describe what they are like: their major cities, mountains and rivers, climates and the way people live. The curriculum asks for a focus on environmental regions and on some of the world’s most significant physical and human features, but schools choose which countries and places to study. A clear picture of the continent helps children understand the world beyond Europe.

North America: countries and features, explained

North America is a continent, not a single country. Its three largest countries are Canada, the United States of America and Mexico. South of Mexico lies Central America, a narrow strip of seven small countries from Belize and Guatemala down to Panama. Out in the Caribbean Sea are many island nations, such as Cuba, Jamaica and the Bahamas. Greenland, a self-governing territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, is also part of North America geographically. The National Curriculum says only that pupils should locate countries in North and South America, so schools decide how many to learn and in how much depth.

Physical features give the continent its shape. The Rocky Mountains run down the west side from Canada into the USA, and the older, lower Appalachian Mountains lie in the east. Between them are the huge flat Great Plains, a major farming region. The five Great Lakes lie between the USA and Canada: four of them are shared by the two countries, and Lake Michigan is entirely in the USA. Rivers such as the Mississippi, the Colorado and the St Lawrence are among the major ones. The Grand Canyon in Arizona was carved over millions of years by the Colorado River. Mexico has mountain ranges, volcanoes and desert in the north.

The continent is so large that it has almost every environmental region. Northern Canada and Alaska have cold tundra, with frozen ground for much of the year. Further south, belts of conifer forest stretch across Canada. The middle of the continent is temperate grassland, the south-west of the USA and northern Mexico are hot and dry, and Central America and the Caribbean are tropical. The Caribbean also has a hurricane season, which runs from about June to November.

Human geography covers languages, cities, farming and industry. Washington DC is the capital of the USA, Ottawa the capital of Canada and Mexico City the capital of Mexico. Larger and better-known cities, such as New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal, are not national capitals. English is widely spoken, English and French are Canada’s two official languages, and Spanish is the main language of Mexico and most of Central America, though English is the official language of Belize. Indigenous peoples lived across the continent long before European settlers arrived, and their communities remain today.

Children practise using maps, atlases, globes and digital mapping to find these places and describe them. They learn to say where a place is using compass directions and neighbouring countries, and to compare, for example, a Canadian city with one in Mexico. Because the countries are so big, pupils also meet the idea that places within one country can be very different, and that a large country can contain several time zones.

Words your child will hear

Continent: A very large land area. North America is one of seven.
Isthmus: A narrow strip of land joining two larger areas, like Panama, which joins North and South America.
Great Plains: The huge area of flat grassland in the middle of North America.
Tundra: Cold, treeless land in the far north where the ground below the surface stays frozen all year.
Hurricane: A powerful tropical storm with strong winds and heavy rain.
Tributary: A smaller river that flows into a larger one.
Delta: Low, flat land where a river splits into channels as it meets the sea.

What the National Curriculum says

The programme of study for Key Stage 2 says:

Pupils should be taught to locate the world’s countries, using maps to focus on Europe (including the location of Russia) and North and South America, concentrating on their environmental regions, key physical and human characteristics, countries, and major cities
Pupils should be taught to use maps, atlases, globes and digital/computer mapping to locate countries and describe features studied
This will include the location and characteristics of a range of the world’s most significant human and physical features.

Objectives from the National Curriculum in England, © Crown copyright, used under the Open Government Licence v3.0.

Try it: describing a river from an atlas

Using an atlas, describe where the Mississippi River is and why it matters.

Find the Mississippi in the atlas index and turn to the map of the USA. The river is shown as a long blue line running through the middle of the country.
Describe the route using compass points. The Mississippi starts in the north of the USA, in the state of Minnesota, and flows generally south across the country.
Find the mouth. It passes New Orleans and enters the Gulf of Mexico, where the river spreads out into a low, marshy delta.
Add the tributaries. Large rivers such as the Missouri and the Ohio flow into the Mississippi, so it drains water from a huge area of the central USA.
Say who uses it. Cities such as Minneapolis, St Louis, Memphis and New Orleans grew up on its banks. Barges carry grain and other bulky goods along the river, and the farmland alongside it is very productive.

The Mississippi is a very long river in the middle of the USA. It flows from Minnesota in the north, south to the Gulf of Mexico beyond New Orleans. Rivers such as the Missouri and the Ohio join it. Major cities, farms and barge traffic depend on it.

Common mistakes and how to help

Using “America” to mean only the USA

In everyday speech, “America” usually means the United States, so children are unsure whether Canada and Mexico belong to the same continent.

What helps: Say “North America” for the continent and “the USA” for the country. Trace the continent’s outline on a globe and name all the countries inside it.

Leaving Central America and the Caribbean out of North America

Maps often focus on the big three countries, so the narrow strip south of Mexico and the scattered islands get ignored.

What helps: Count the countries between Mexico and the start of South America together. Ask your child which sea separates the islands from the mainland.

Thinking the largest or most famous city is the capital

New York and Toronto appear in films and news so often that children assume they must be capitals.

What helps: Make a pairs game of country, capital and best-known city: USA, Washington DC and New York; Canada, Ottawa and Toronto; Mexico, Mexico City and Mexico City.

Picturing the climate as the same across a whole country

Children often think of Canada as all snow and the USA as all sunshine, because those are the pictures they see most.

What helps: Compare Vancouver, Chicago and Miami on a weather map. Ask how far north or south each is and how close to the sea or mountains.

How to help at home

Trace a road trip. Choose two cities, such as Vancouver and Toronto or Los Angeles and New York, and plan a route across the continent on an atlas. Name the mountains, plains, rivers and lakes you would pass.
Check the label. Look for foods and objects from North America at home, such as maple syrup from Canada or avocados from Mexico. Find the country on a map and talk about the climate it needs.
Compare two weather forecasts. Watch the forecast for a northern city and a southern one for a week. Which is colder, which is wetter, and what does their position on the map tell you?
Make a sketch map. Draw North America with the three biggest countries, the Great Lakes, the Rocky Mountains and the Mississippi. Add one city in each country, then compare with an atlas and fix anything that is off.

Builds on

Leads on to

Key Stage 3: Africa: regions, countries and cities
Key Stage 3: Russia: the world’s largest country
Key Stage 3: Asia, including China and India
Key Stage 3: The Middle East: location and landscapes