This exercise teaches you how to use Microsoft MapPoint to investigate infant mortality in a large city.
Infant mortality is a good indicator of development. This web page from Matthew White's Historical Atlas of the 20th century will show you why! What pattern of infant mortality would you expect to see in a large city like London?
How to make a map of infant mortality
using Microsoft MapPoint
MapPoint requires spatially referenced data - that is data that can be matched to an area that MapPoint already knows. Download and save an Excel file containing infant mortality data for London boroughs by clicking here Make sure you can find it again easily!
1)
Start Microsoft MapPoint. Click on this icon 
2)
Start a new map. Click on data and data mapping wizard 
3)
Tell MapPoint what kind of map to draw. Select "Shaded
Area" map type and click "next" 
4)
Tell MapPoint where to find the data. Click the radio button
"Import data to map it" 
and "next"
5) Tell MapPoint about the type of area to map. In the column heading marked borough Click "data type" and choose "county" from the drop down box.Click "Finish " The dialogue box should look like this:
6) MapPoint needs to know which set of data to map. From the next dialogue box select "Infant mortality rate" and "show the data by county"Click next
7) Choose the colour scheme for your map Select the desired colour scheme and click "finish"
8)
Format the map by clicking and dragging a rectangle around
the map, and clicking again to zoom in. Choose "Data Map"
from the drop down box to remove the road pattern. Reduce the map font
size by choosing "view" "map font" and "smallest"
Hopefully you should now be looking at a map of infant mortality in London! Hyperlinks to other web sites, or "pushpins" containing information can all be added to the map. Although it is fiddly, you can try adding hospitals to your map. Do this by clicking "View" and "Show or Hide Places" Uncheck all the boxes except for Hospitals and then click "Apply"
You won't be able to see the hospitals until you choose "Road and Data Map" and zoom in. You can add pushpins over the hospitals so that they can still be seen when the map is zoomed out again. (See the example below)
The map can be saved as a web page!
Click
on the thumbnail for an example of a finished map (showing hospitals
in Sutton)
Think about................
What are the advantages of using ICT to draw maps?
How can you describe the pattern?
What other information would you need to help you explain the pattern?
In Part 2 learn how to combine information on a MapPoint map and investigate the reasons for the differences in infant mortality in London boroughs.