Elementary: a curiosity-first entry course

Grasp the "big picture" and "ways of seeing" in 3–10 minutes. Easy to spin off inquiry questions.

The standard map service that lets you cut across maps, routes, Street View, and reviews worldwide. With Gemini AI–powered "Ask Maps" you can do natural conversational searches, and the 3D immersive navigation lets you confirm a route with on-site feel. A starting point for places, facilities, and traffic — usable at any age.

Layer topographic maps, aerial photos, elevation, and disaster information to read the "why of place".

Quickly strengthen the foundations of geography inquiry: bearings, scales, map symbols.

An entry that makes statistics "not scary". A first step in reading numbers.

Learn ways to see natural history and science from real examples of exhibits and research.

The official kids' portal starring JMA mascot 'Harerūn'. Entry point for weather and meteorology.

Animated series introducing JMA's work and the science behind weather.

Official JMA pamphlet explaining the role and work of Japan's meteorological agency.

An illustrated web encyclopedia from an educational publisher covering science and nature.

Programs and content for young children and elementary students, organized by theme.

JAXA's fun entry point: space exploration news, games, and activities for young learners.

Elementary-to-high-school content from Japan's ocean research and development agency.

Activities of the National Institute of Polar Research, Science Museum exhibits, and aurora footage.

Video content, research data, and educational materials from Japan's national astronomy research center.

The Ministry of Education's learning support portal for children, organized by subject.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs' kids' site: learn, research, and play with countries of the world.

Agriculture, forestry, and fisheries explained for children — official Ministry portal.

Kids' videos and explanations from Japan's Coast Guard on maritime safety.

Child-friendly explanations of traffic safety, crime prevention, and community policing.

The NPA's kids page covering safety, traffic rules, and police work for children.

Video content and explanations of Japan's Self-Defense Forces, made accessible for children.

The Ministry of Justice's children's portal on laws, courts, human rights, and immigration.

Kids and family portal of the US Library of Congress.

NASA's official kids' site for upper elementary: space and Earth science.

Learn about climate change through games and animations — NASA's official kids' site.

NASA's official kids' club: games, activities, and content about space and Earth science.

Children's media to explore countries, animals, nature, and peoples of the world.

Encyclopaedia Britannica's kid-friendly portal — reliable reference for school research.

BBC's curriculum-aligned learning platform with video explanations and quizzes for UK school subjects.

DK's richly illustrated kids' encyclopedia covering science, history, nature, and space.

Children's rights, SDGs, videos, quizzes, and research content in multiple languages.

Tokyo's official disaster preparedness workbook for elementary school students.

Family-focused disaster preparedness content — easy first steps for children and guardians.

400+ geography quizzes covering countries, capitals, flags, oceans, and lakes.

World changes since 1800 and Dollar Street: what life looks like sorted by income level.

Real-time global flight tracking — see aircraft positions, routes, and flight data live.

Real-time global vessel tracking using AIS data — ships, ferries, and cargo.

Traditional Japanese performing arts — kabuki, noh, bunraku — explained for children with video.

MIT Media Lab's free visual programming platform for ages 8–16.

Community-built Scratch projects simulating earthquakes and disaster scenarios for learning.

Curated Scratch studio with student-made disaster-preparedness simulations.

Scratch studio with community-created disaster information and earthquake educational materials.

Kids' coding with Minecraft, Frozen, and more — game-based introduction to programming.

Minecraft's Hour of Code activities for introducing programming concepts to beginners.

A faster, mod-friendly Scratch compiler — run and share Scratch projects at higher speed.

Scratch educator community operated by the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

A free digital picture book with read-aloud narration of Japanese mythology — the Jimmu Tosei legend.

Japan's national library for children's literature — rare and historical children's books from Japan and abroad.

A "kid-oriented" entry that walks through the work and structure of the national government in one go.

Read the news in plain Japanese → easy to turn social issues into inquiry topics.

"Exhibition-style overviews" you can read by theme. The way to look at sources naturally develops.

A "kids-oriented" entry to start learning about disasters. A perfect match for local inquiry.

Catch the inside stories of historical decisions in Japan and the world in 15–30 minute videos.

Grasp the dense stories of Sengoku warlords through dramatic visuals faithful to historical fact.

The Smithsonian — one of the world's largest museum complexes — publishes its images, 3D models, and audio under CC0 Open Access. Young readers and researchers alike can reach world-class primary materials through the same door.

A free, collaboratively built encyclopedia of living things, compiled by public institutions, museums, and researchers worldwide. Photos, taxonomy, and distribution maps make it easy to trace "what is this creature?" from a name. English text, but readable even at elementary level through images and maps.

A cross-cultural hub that brings together collections from museums and cultural sites worldwide, including Street View tours inside institutions. Accessible for children, but since it is privately operated, always trace each work back to its source institution.

The official list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites — search by country, region, and category.

Learn ways to see field sites and how to grasp value, with ruins and cultural properties as material.

Official commentary by the national museum. A useful entry to works, eras, and techniques.

Search by place name and the "layers of regional culture" become visible.

48 Japanese Geoparks, 10 of which are UNESCO Global Geoparks.

3D view and VR tours of the National Museum of Nature and Science exhibits.

3D data experience: T. rex skeletons and taxidermied animal specimens.

Virtual tours and exhibition content from the National Institute of Polar Research science museum.

Interactive quizzes and simulators to learn about weather, typhoons, and earthquakes in a fun way.

Nationwide current conditions, forecasts, and rain-cloud radar from the Japan Weather Association.

Visible imagery from Himawari-8/9, updated every 2.5 minutes over Japan, with 11 zoom levels.

Wind and ocean current flows animated on a globe. Japanese interface available.

Multi-layer visualization: radar, satellite, wind, rain, temperature, clouds, waves, and air quality.

Wind depicted as streamlines. Models: GFS, HRRR, GEM, ICON. Ad-free.

NASA 3D visual tool to explore Earth, the solar system, and space.

A geographic browser to fly around the entire planet in 3D. Visually grasp "the world now and then" through satellite imagery, terrain, 3D buildings, and Timelapse (year-by-year change of satellite photos). The "Voyager" feature also hosts 3D tours of World Heritage sites and stories on endangered species and the SDGs. An entry to geography, history, disaster prevention, and international comparison — usable at any age.

A location service that divides the world into 3-metre squares and assigns each one a unique address of three words. Over 57 trillion squares cover the globe, and the same square shows different words depending on the language setting (61 languages are supported per the official support pages, as of 2026). It can pinpoint parks, coastlines, mountain trails, and evacuation sites that have no street address, and police, fire, and ambulance services in the UK and elsewhere have adopted it. The app and online map are free; the business and developer API is paid, though it is offered free to emergency services and NGOs.

Confirm nationwide disaster risks (flood, landslide, storm surge, tsunami, etc.) from MLIT via the "Layered Hazard Map" and "My Town Hazard Map". An entry for local disaster prevention and geography inquiry.

Overlay Edo, Meiji, and prewar old maps semi-transparently on modern maps. Visually read changes in place names, waterways, and roads. An entry to historical geography, usable from elementary to professional.

A public digital archive at Stanford University Libraries holding over 150,000 historical maps of the world, 15th century to present, at high resolution. Even young learners can enjoy "how people used to picture the world" as images.

Side-by-side switching of topographic maps from the Meiji era onward for 59 regions across Japan.

Old maps from Japan's Geospatial Information Authority — from Edo-period surveying to early modern topographic maps.

Real-time water level monitoring for rivers nationwide — video-linked observation points.

Switch between aerial photos from the 1970s to the present — some areas from 1936 — in a two-panel linked view.

Type any city name and this visualiser draws every road it finds in OpenStreetMap as a single line-art plate. Lets you read the shape of a city at a glance — grid, radial, or organic where rivers and coastlines have reshaped it — and line up two cities side by side for comparison.

The prefectural disaster portal run by the Hokkaido Government Crisis Management Bureau. It gathers shelter-opening status by municipality, evacuation orders, weather warnings, and earthquake information, and lets you check evacuation sites on a map or as a list.

The prefectural disaster information portal run by the Aomori Prefectural Government Crisis Management Bureau. Alongside guidance on checking hazard maps, it gathers information drawn from the prefecture's disaster GIS, such as evacuation sites and major medical institutions.

Iwate Prefecture's public GIS. Layers from several fields — crime incidence, erosion-control GIS content such as landslide hazard zones, and designated-road maps — can be stacked on a single map. Municipal websites within the prefecture also point here for checking landslide risk areas.

An electronic map from Iwate Prefecture for finding barrier-free and universal-design facilities from the map itself. It runs on the same prefectural GIS platform as the Iwate Digital Map.

A page where Iwate Prefecture gathers walking maps from around the prefecture as part of its health-promotion work, leading through to courses created by individual municipalities.

The prefectural disaster portal run by the Miyagi Prefectural Government Crisis Management Department. It provides earthquake information and road-restriction information in real time, and doubles as the entrance to field-specific systems such as the prefecture's erosion-control and river-basin information systems.

A cultural-property map published by Yamagata Prefecture, showing the locations of archaeological sites (buried cultural property areas) together with nationally and prefecturally designated, nationally registered, and nationally selected cultural properties. GIS data export was added in January 2026.

The prefectural disaster portal run by the Disaster Countermeasures Division of the Fukushima Prefectural Government. It brings shelter information together with weather and disaster information in one place, and together with the prefecture's disaster website serves as the entrance to hazard maps.

A prefecture-wide integrated GIS built and operated jointly by Ibaraki Prefecture and every municipality within it. Map information held separately by the prefecture and by municipalities is published together on one electronic map, covering administrative information, everyday-life information, events, and tourism. It went into service in fiscal 2008.

A municipality-by-municipality list of the "Ibaraki Health Road" walking courses designated by Ibaraki Prefecture for health promotion, chosen so that everyone from children to older people can walk them safely. They can also be found on a map through the Ibaraki Digital Map.

Tochigi Prefecture's new integrated map system, in service since 11 March 2026. It brings disaster information and public-facility information — previously separate — onto a single map, covering hazard maps, real-time rainfall and river-level observations, real-time road and river camera images, the Tochigi cycle routes, major congestion points, and urban planning information such as land-use zoning. The former Tochigi map information system closed on 31 March 2026.

A site introducing walking courses selected by Tochigi Prefecture. It carries 167 courses across the prefecture and can be searched by municipality, with distance, walking time, and characteristics given for each course.

Gunma Prefecture's integrated GIS for residents. Information the prefecture holds on safety and security, along with practical everyday information, is placed on an electronic map. Many fields are published — tourism facilities, environment, welfare, healthcare, disaster preparedness — with both desktop and smartphone versions.

The tourism digital map on Gunma Prefecture's official tourism site — a digital version of the prefectural tourism map introducing sights and attractions across Gunma. Spots are presented by theme (hot springs, nature, food, traditional culture), and landmarks in each area appear as illustrations on the map itself.

Walking courses supervised by Gunma Prefecture, with course maps arranged by the prefecture's four regions — central, northern, western, and eastern Gunma.

An integrated GIS where geographic information held by Saitama Prefecture — hazard maps, barrier-free maps and more — is browsable across seven categories such as childcare and daily life, and healthcare and welfare. Multiple maps can be overlaid, and most can be downloaded as CSV, Excel, or shapefiles. The service opened on 30 January 2024.

On the site of Saitama Prefecture's health mileage programme, a list of walking courses recommended by individual municipalities. Tokorozawa, Tsurugashima, Moroyama, Yokoze, Satte, Kasukabe and others appear, and some courses are refreshed with the seasons.

The prefecture's integrated map site, publishing Chiba's administrative and regional information online through maps and imagery. It holds maps across many fields, including urban planning information and buried cultural property areas, and since April 2022 data can also be downloaded across 24 categories such as the locations of prefectural institutions.

A walking map created by Chiba Prefecture's dietary improvement volunteers, who picked roads that are easy to use and easy to walk locally and built courses of roughly 10,000 steps each. There are 102 courses in all, with step counts, distances, and times given for the whole route and for each landmark segment. Copies can also be consulted at the Chiba Prefectural Archives.

A page on which the health promotion division of the Chiba Prefectural Government gathers the walking maps individual municipalities have made for themselves, to be used alongside the prefecture's own walking map.

An integrated map that gathers the map services held by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government's many bureaus into a single site, run jointly by the Bureau of Digital Services and GovTech Tokyo. Ten map layers spanning disaster preparedness, environment and nature, digital services, welfare, and waterworks can be freely combined and stacked on one screen. Three ready-made themes — protecting yourself from summer heat, preparing for an earthquake, and preparing for flooding — open with the relevant maps already combined. Layers include the Tokyo Heat Map, the Tokyo Damage Estimate Map, emergency water supply stations, TOKYO FREE Wi-Fi, and projected inundation areas. The full release began on 20 August 2026.

A portal run by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Bureau of Public Health that gathers walking courses created by wards, cities, and other bodies into one place. 555 courses are registered and can be searched by municipality, by major rail line, or by purpose. Each course carries estimates of distance, walking time, calories burned, and step count, with the conversion assumptions (4 km/h, 70 cm per step, 60 kg body weight) stated on the site. Features such as "Tokyo Machi-sanpo" and "Try walking for 10 minutes", plus a search for what lies around each course, are included. An English version is available.

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government's official map for finding shelters and evacuation areas across the city. Alongside names and locations, it shows each shelter's opening status and crowding level during a disaster using five-step icons. Pages are available in several languages.

The prefecture's integrated map site for viewing Kanagawa's map information online. It holds thematic maps across many fields — prefectural facilities, projected inundation areas, location maps of privately owned forests covered by the regional forest plan. Urban planning information is shown too, though for the exact land-use designations the site directs you to each city or town.

The walking-road information pages within "Kenko Niigata 21", the health promotion portal of the Niigata Prefectural Government's Health and Welfare Department, introducing walking courses across the prefecture.

The walking map on "Toyama Health Lab", the Toyama Prefectural Government's health promotion portal, introducing walking courses both indoors and outdoors.

The digital map on Ishikawa Prefecture's official tourism site, run by the Ishikawa Prefecture Tourism League. Sightseeing spots, food, and accommodation across the prefecture can be browsed on the map and filtered by interest or means of travel.

The map content on Yamanashi Prefecture's official tourism information site, run by the Yamanashi Tourism Organization. Tourism information can be explored with an overview map of the prefecture. The same site also publishes walking maps such as a guide to Yamanashi's castles and residences, and features on strolling and walking.

The integrated GIS run by the Planning and Promotion Department of the Nagano Prefectural Government. Bureaus inside the prefectural office share map information while also publishing it to residents online, covering mountain-disaster risk districts, steep-slope collapse risk points, designated landslide zones, erosion-control designated land, evacuation facilities, and forest-related information. Features include split-screen display, layer transparency, route search, KML export, and GPS location and address or facility search on the smartphone version.

A collection of walking courses compiled by the Health and Welfare Department of the Nagano Prefectural Government from 270 routes recommended by the prefecture's 64 municipalities, arranged by region and by municipality. Each course is classed as flat, slightly undulating, or undulating, with regional pages for Saku, Josho, Suwa and others.

A page on which the Health Promotion Division of the Gifu Prefectural Government gathers entry points to walking courses created by the prefecture's municipalities — bridging to their courses rather than building its own.

An integrated GIS in which Aichi Prefecture places its location-related geographic information on an electronic map for residents and businesses. Layers are grouped under headings such as living and safety, learning and leisure, and prefectural administration, and can be combined freely into your own map. It holds landslide hazard zones, storm-surge inundation projections, tsunami hazard zones, and flood history maps, and also publishes a red relief image map.

Walking maps published by "Mie no Rekishi Kaido", Mie Prefecture's cultural site, carrying course maps for walking the province's historical highways.

An integrated GIS in which Kyoto Prefecture and every municipality within it publish their map information together through a single system, in service since 1 February 2008. Alongside shelter, AED, and emergency medical maps, it carries a wide range of location data including World Cultural Heritage sites and bear sightings. On smartphones and tablets, GPS centres the search for facilities on where you stand. Desktop, mobile, and smartphone versions are provided.

An inter-municipal integrated GIS launched in 2026 through cooperation between Tottori Prefecture and 13 municipalities within it. It carries data across many fields at once: tourism, events, childcare support, a bear sighting map, cultural properties, disaster preparedness, crime and accidents, public facilities, medical facilities, environment, and forests.

A system in which Tottori Prefecture provides regional and administrative information online through maps. Alongside public facilities and municipal offices, hospitals and waste treatment facilities can also be found.

A web GIS for searching and browsing administrative map information from Shimane Prefecture and its municipalities. Built as the prefecture's integrated GIS, it gathers map information from across the prefectural government — welfare, disaster preparedness, agriculture and forestry — and can display it over base maps or aerial photographs. Residents can also contribute map information of their own. The underlying topographic and road network data is published on Shimane data eye.

A prefecture-wide integrated GIS built by Okayama Prefecture and in service since April 2002. It publishes disaster information (shelters, suitable helipad sites, rainfall and water-level or tide gauges), seismic intensity maps, liquefaction risk maps, tsunami inundation projections, projected inundation areas, landslide hazard zones, land use, ground data, irrigation ponds, cultural properties, and EV charging facilities. An "Okayama Original Map" feature lets you build your own map over aerial photographs or base maps.

An information map on sediment disasters published by the Public Works Department of the Ehime Prefectural Government, letting you check on a map where landslide risk lies.

The disaster mapping published by Kochi Prefecture. It carries flood and landslide disaster maps, projected inundation areas for designated rivers, landslide hazard and special hazard zones, mountain-disaster risk districts, and designated erosion-control, landslide, and steep-slope areas — along with a three-dimensional hazard map.

A site on which Saga Prefecture publishes its disaster and emergency information online through maps. The prefecture also runs a separate river system, "Suibo-kun", for water-level gauges and advance traffic restrictions.

A site on which Okinawa Prefecture publishes regional and administrative information online through maps, covering the locations of administrative institutions, prefectural housing, prefectural urban parks, municipal information, and tsunami inundation projections. GIS data download became available in fiscal 2020, and on 8 March 2023 a policy on using geospatial information within the system was adopted. A prefectural GIS open data catalogue is also provided.

The city's map service bringing together urban planning, roads, disaster information (shelters and evacuation areas), outdoor advertising, and district plans. It merged the previously separate urban planning service and the city disaster map, relaunching on 29 June 2018.

A site on which Sendai City provides facility information and disaster-related information on an electronic map. The city separately publishes an urban planning information service, and releases its land-number maps as open data in shapefile format.

A digital tourism map created by Koriyama City, built around high-quality 360-degree panoramic footage and video shot by drone so that the feel of each place comes through.

A service on which Saitama City publishes public facilities, daily life, urban planning, and landslide hazard maps. Past flood history can also be checked by clicking on the map.

The system through which Taito City publishes urban planning and other information on an online map. It covers ward facilities and parks, urban planning information such as land-use zoning, floor-area ratios and height districts, road administrators, route numbers and certified road widths, road categories under the Building Standards Act, and the AEDs available to the public within the ward.

The system through which Toshima City lets users check the ward's varied information on a map using GIS — public facilities, childcare facilities, nearby play areas, parks, emergency medical institutions, community cat activity, and ground survey data such as borehole logs. The ward's use of GIS has been recognised as a leading example of statistical utilisation.

A system letting users find facility locations on an electronic map in Itabashi City. Clicking an icon brings up the facility's information and a link to its website. Part of what is published here is also offered as open data in CSV form.

Walking maps compiled by Itabashi City from a cultural and tourism perspective. The ward also issues a tourism guide map.

The system through which Nerima City publishes information useful in daily life — ward facilities, roads, parks — on a map. Categories span ward offices, health and welfare, hospitals and AEDs, environment and cleaning, transport, disaster preparedness, children, schools, culture and learning, community, parks and sports, farm plots, urban planning, road networks, and landscape zones. It was relaunched on 3 December 2024 with a new URL.

A service through which Edogawa City provides the ward's map information online, usable from smartphones. The ward separately runs a designated road information service for urban planning and the Building Standards Act, and publishes map data as open data.

Walking course maps compiled by the Health and Social Welfare Bureau of Yokohama City, ranging in character from a route along the old Tokaido to forest trails and waterside walks.

A GIS Niigata City publishes for residents, visitors, and businesses. Public facilities, disaster information, roadside land values, and urban planning can be checked on the map, with search by address or facility name and measurement of distance and area. The city offers its GIS data as open data under CC BY 2.1 Japan and publishes 1:2,500 topographic map data.

Matsumoto City's public GIS. GPS on a smartphone or tablet brings up the map around where you stand, with facility and route search nearby. The city separately produces walking maps for 35 districts under its "citizens walking" campaign, noting local features such as wells, wayside shrines, and historic sites.

An integrated GIS gathering the geographic information Shizuoka City holds — locations of public facilities, designated urban planning and disaster areas, and tourism and welfare facilities. It carries twenty categories including public facility locations, hazard maps, and neighbourhood association areas. Published on 31 January 2025, its geographic information is offered as open data usable without formality.

The system through which Kobe City publishes its administrative information on maps, covering evacuation sites, hazard maps, AEDs, gathering places for older residents, and elementary school districts. Urban planning information such as land-use zones and planned roads and parks can also be searched here.

Ideal for practicing reading images as primary sources.

Ideal as a first contact point with history.

Japanese folktales from across the country, in audio narration and text.

Japan's national Ainu museum and symbolic space for indigenous Ainu culture and coexistence.

Database of the classic anime series 'Manga Nihon Mukashibanashi' — Japanese folktales in animation.

The official NHK for School hub for teachers. Reverse-look up programs, worksheets, lesson plans, and case studies by subject, grade, and unit. The standard go-to for new teachers who need materials that connect directly to tomorrow's lesson.

A friendly Japanese-history encyclopedia readable from elementary up. Clear explanations of figures, eras, and events. A vocabulary foothold new teachers can use right away as the opening reading or prompt material for a lesson.

The Ministry of Education's portal gathering classroom practice with 1:1 devices. Ideas are organized by subject and scene so new teachers can picture the first step of ICT use concretely.

A group of free teacher-facing educational journals from Teikoku-Shoin delivering lesson-research examples, latest scholarship, and practice reports across geography, history, and civics. The family includes the education magazine "Kizahashi", the elementary-school "Children and Maps", the junior-high "Shakaika no Shiori", and the high-school "ChiReKo" — particularly strong support for geography teachers' materials research.

The Library of Congress's teacher-facing page on using primary sources. Publishes primary materials for history, social studies, and literature together with questioning examples and lesson procedures. Useful both as source material for new teachers and as a reference model for experienced teachers designing inquiry-based lessons.

Integrated portal for school broadcast programs, web content, and archives.

Official samples showing how the same map data changes appearance when only the style file is swapped. Six variants, including a road-emphasis map, a railway-emphasis map, and a hiragana map designed for younger pupils. Japanese.