i actually think that teaching kids how to create a map would be a really useful skill. with the wealth of available data out there and the easy-to-use tools available (like ArcGIS Online) nowadays, it really only takes a few minutes to create a map with a couple of datasets, and once you know how to do one, you can apply it to so many other purposes, whether environmental science, public health, social science, marketing, etc… if you’re in the USA, the elections are coming up, and there’s nothing more satisfying than creating an election map and throwing that up against some sociodemographic data to see how one affects the other.
if a given school has an animal mascot, or if there’s a state flower or a national bird, or something like that, it might be fun to find where such an animal, flower, or bird lives using iNaturalist data. maybe if you can find historical ranges, you can compare and talk with the students about how to get the ranges back to what they used to be and maybe even take action in that county? (maybe get the students in touch with a local conservation group or the county ag department or something like that and see what kinds of things they might be able to help with?)
anyway, good luck with your lesson plans!