A Proposal for Assessment in Geography Education

Abstract

The geographic skills, as outlined in Geography for Life, provide an avenue for assessing students' work in geography. If used across the scope and sequence of the curriculum, a common scoring guide based on these skills offers opportunities for students to demonstrate their ability to use inquiry approaches to study geography and to improve those abilities over time and over different geographic questions. If used consistently, a geographic skills scoring guide can also help to communicate to a broader audience of parents, administration, and the public as to what the discipline of geography encompasses.     

Giant Maps as Pedagogical Tools for Teaching Geography and Mathematics

Giant maps offer a potentially useful pedagogical tool for teaching mathematics and map skills. In this pilot study, giant maps were distributed to elementary schools in Colorado and New Hampshire and teachers were provided with guided activities designed to integrate mathematics and geography skills. In an assessment of student skills, it was found that there were improvements in map-use skills and that students improved in some skills more than others. Additionally, there were differences in gender; girls improved more in their scores for some skills and less than boys in others. The teaching benefits of giant maps merit additional investigation.     

What Kind of Assessment for What Kind of Geography? Advanced Placement Human Geography*

This article raises awareness of the recently introduced Advanced Placement course in Human Geography by describing the design and management of assessment in the course. Standards are maintained through the choice of assessment instrument, the development of test items, scoring, and grade‐setting. The article contributes to a deeper understanding of the opportunities and threats of standardized testing within geography.     

Spatiality,Maps, and Mathematics in Critical Human Geography: Toward a Repetition with Difference

Quantitative and cartographic methods are today often associated with absolute, Newtonian conceptions of space. We argue that some such methods have not always been and need not be so allied. Present geographic approaches to relational space have been largely advanced through radical political economic and feminist thought. Yet we identify quantitative and cartographic methods (taking as exemplars a range of thinkers, some of whom were most prominent in the 1960s and 1970s) that can contribute to these approaches to relational space. We suggest neglected methods to revisit, new alliances to be forged with critical human geography and cultural critique, and possible paths to enliven geographical imaginations.     

自然的社会建构：西方人文地理学对自然的再认识

自然的社会建构作为西方人文地理学界对自然的再思考,渐成为理解自然与社会互动的重要理论框架,并逐步成为推动人地和谐、可持续发展研究的新范式。通过梳理自然的社会建构研究理论源起并对西方涉及自然的社会建构的研究文献进行全面梳理发现,自然的社会建构并非单纯指基于建构主义视角考察自然的知识生产或价值与意义,还应该关注自然被生产与形构的商品化过程。现有议题主要聚焦于政治与自然、商品化与自然、社会情感与自然以及日常生活与自然四大方面。在此基础上,进一步提出了国内未来研究需要关注的重要方向。     

Why Geography Still Needs Pen and Ink Cartography

Abstract

Maps are fundamental in geographic explanation and education, but as map-making becomes firmly entrenched in the GIS lab, it becomes harder for students to imagine how they can make maps for their papers. Students need to illustrate papers with maps: among other things, maps provide clarity, links to real places, and insights into patterns and context of phenomena discussed in student papers. A simple, quick, and aesthetically satisfying method for students to make their own maps is presented. This map making method can help students can think more creatively and geographically about their topics.     

人文与经济地理学的传承与创新：青年学者的责任

2018年1月27-28日,人文与经济地理学青年论坛暨第二届中国科学院区域可持续发展分析与模拟重点实验室青年论坛在北京国家会议中心成功举办。青年论坛以“人文与经济地理学的传承与创新：青年学者的责任与行动”为主题。莅临会场的院士、前辈和主管部门领导纷纷表示鼓励、支持和关怀青年人才的更快更好的成长。在这样的背景下,以这次青年论坛主题为题,在新时代传承和创新人文与经济地理学,青年学者责无旁贷,追寻地理学家的精神,集中探讨青年学者的责任与行动,展示人文与经济地理青年学者的思考和风采。     

Active Learning Strategies and Assessment in World Geography Classes

Abstract

Active learning strategies include a variety of methods, such as inquiry and discovery, in which students are actively engaged in the learning process. This article describes several strategies that can be used in secondary-or college-level world geography courses. The goal of these activities is to foster development of a spatial perspective in students through frequent analysis and interpretation of spatial data. Detailed examples of one particular technique, the “atlas warmup”, are included. Active approaches supplement expository teaching of standards-based geography concepts and current geographic issues. Assessment of the impact of these methods reveals the need for ongoing guided practice in the use of these skills.     

Applying Geography Course Projects to Issues in City Resilience and Global Connectivity

Globalization would appear to be a subject that easily could be addressed in geography classrooms, yet this is not always the case. In terms of pedagogy, many geographers are concerned whether the field has been adequately engaging various components of this topic (e.g., connectivity, core-periphery), especially in terms of making the subject matter relevant to students. This article presents the results of a recent course project situated at the intersection of city-level resilience to hazards and connectivity with the global economy, utilizing SWOT analysis. The student projects demonstrated that this comparatively simple analytical tool was a useful means for exploring and integrating key topics in globalization and urban-economic geography, while also facilitating a problem-based learning environment.     

20世纪90年代以来欧美人文地理学(导论)教材编写新趋向及其启示

基于对欧美人文地理学（导论）教材出版的新情况,对相关问题作些尝试性的探讨,以期为编写出优秀且符合时代要求的人文地理学（导论）教材提供一些参考。欧美同类教材的趋向：① 在原有多样化的基础上重构;② 概念主导的教材在增长;③ 概念主导教材的作者在增多。这些新动向给我们的启示：① 针对多样化的需要,编出多样化的导论教材;② 加强教材的学术性和思想性;③ 教材写作要突出基本概念,培养地理学思维。     

Mapping Soils,Vegetation, and Landforms: An Integrative Physical Geography Field Experience*

Students in a graduate seminar at Michigan State University produced a series of detailed vegetation, soils, and landform maps of a 1.5‐square‐mile (3.9 km²) study area in southwest Lower Michigan. The learning outcomes (maps) and skill development objectives (sampling strategies and various GIS applications) of this field‐intensive mapping experience were driven by the assumption that students learn and understand relationships among physical landscape variables better by mapping them than they would in a classroom‐based experience. The group‐based, problem‐solving format was also intended to foster collaboration and camaraderie. The study area lies within a complex, interlobate moraine. Fieldwork involved mapping in groups of two or three, as well as soil and vegetation sampling. Spatial data products assembled and used in the project included topographic maps, a digital elevation model (DEM), aerial photographs, and NRCS (National Resource Conservation Service) soil maps. Most of the soils are dry and sandy, with the main differentiating characteristic being the amount of, and depth to, subsurface clay bands (lamellae) or gravelly zones. The presettlement (early 1830s) vegetation of the area was oak forest, oak savanna, and black oak “barrens.” Upland sites currently support closed forests of white, black, and red oak, with a red maple, dogwood, and sassafras understory. Ecological data suggest that these oak forests will, barring major disturbance, become increasingly dominated by red maple. This group‐based, problem‐solving approach to physical geography education has several advantages over traditional classroom‐based teaching and could also be successfully applied in other, field‐related disciplines.     

Wireless Mapping,GIS, and Learning about the Digital Divide: A Classroom Experience

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to describe a capstone course in undergraduate student geographical research in which GIS and other geospatial tools were used to teach undergraduate students basic geographical principles. The course uses the “cooperative learning” pedagogical approach to address one of a number of client-supplied research projects, chosen on the basis of logistical difficulty, time, student ability, and project importance. In the connection of primary data with existing data, students confronted a number of important research issues such as mapping ethics, database design and management, time management, group dynamics, and research limitations.     

传承和发扬人文与经济地理学前辈的精神和知识体系——人文与经济地理学青年论坛综述

2018年1月27-28日,人文与经济地理学青年论坛暨第二届中国科学院区域可持续发展分析与模拟重点实验室青年论坛在北京国家会议中心成功举办。论坛以“人文与经济地理学的传承与创新：青年学者的责任与行动”为主题,来自全国100余家高校和研究机构从事人文与经济地理学相关研究的青年学者370余人参会。这说明人文与经济地理学青年学者很活跃、有热情、有担当意识。青年学者要加强学习、传承和发扬人文与经济地理学前辈的精神和知识体系,迎接人文与经济地理学繁荣发展的新时代。     

The National Geography Standards and Your Undergraduate Curriculum: The Opportunity That Knocks More Than Once

Abstract

Geography For Life: National Geography Standards 1994 offers university geographers opportunities in the areas of program assessment and development. This article describes an assessment process that is applicable to both individual courses and geography programs. The process can strengthen programs by making them more consistent. As a result, geography may have a more powerful presence in teacher certification programs. Additional techniques for enhancing geography's role in preservice education curricula are also outlined. Finally, the article expresses concern that geographers at the university level will not take the recently published National Geography Standards seriously, thinking they apply only to K-12 education. They are challenged to extend the Standards' scope and content to the baccalaureate degree.     

Mentoring Early Career Faculty in Geography: Issues and Strategies*

Early career geography faculty in colleges and universities in the United States are positioned at the leading edge of a challenging period of change in higher education. Demands brought on by new technologies, new administrative and research pressures, and an increasingly competitive campus climate, may make it difficult to balance teaching, research, and service while also trying to maintain a personal life. This article argues that many geographers could benefit from the support of mentoring. Using ideas generated by participants in the Association of American Geographers' recent project, the Geography Faculty Development Alliance, I provide both pragmatic and personal suggestions for establishing these all‐important mentoring relationships to help cope with the pressures facing early career faculty.     

Critical Thinking in Physical Geography: Linking Concepts of Content and Applicability

Abstract

This research examines the effectiveness of problem-based learning (PBL) in an online geographic information systems (GIS) course for adult learners. Adults expect to take greater control of their learning and tend to be self-directed. Students are encouraged to take an active role as problem-solvers in PBL courses. The effectiveness of PBL in face-to-face courses has been shown. Effectiveness in online courses is demonstrated in this study. The performance and experiences of students and instructor in two online courses are compared. The results show that PBL can be more engaging than traditional methods, making PBL-GIS a good choice for an online adult audience.     

Telegraph Messenger Boys: Crossing the Borders between History of Technology and Human Geography*

Historians of telegraphy have traditionally focused on the system‐builders who invented wire communications technologies and incorporated them into profit‐making enterprises. Geographers of communications have traditionally traced the changes that the telegraph network wrought on the rank‐size of cities and the speed of business. Both have ignored the history of the telegraph messenger boys and the “lived geography” of the telegraph network. This article summarizes a study of telegraph messengers as both active components of technological systems and laboring agents within produced urban spaces, bringing together the fields of both history of technology and human geography.     

Spatial Analysis Techniques as Successful Mineral-Potential Mapping Tools for Orogenic Gold Deposits in the Northern Fennoscandian Shield,Finland

Geoscientific Information Systems (GIS) provide tools to quantitatively analyze and integrate spatially referenced information from geological, geophysical, and geochemical surveys for decision-making processes. Excellent coverage of well-documented, precise and good quality data enables testing of variable exploration models in an efficient and cost effective way with GIS tools. Digital geoscientific data from the Geological Survey of Finland (GTK) are being used widely as spatial evidence in exploration targeting, that is ranking areas based on their exploration importance. In the last few years, spatial analysis techniques including weights-of-evidence, logistic regression, and fuzzy logic, have been increasingly used in GTK’s mineral exploration and geological mapping projects. Special emphasis has been put into the exploration for gold because of the excellent data coverage within the prospective volcanic belts and because of the increased activity in gold exploration in Finland during recent years. In this paper, we describe some successful case histories of using the weights-of-evidence method for the Au-potential mapping. These projects have shown that, by using spatial modeling techniques, exploration targets can be generated by quantitatively analyzing extensive amounts of data from various sources and to rank these target areas based on their exploration potential.     

Traces: Philosophy,Interpretation, and Method in Postqualitative Human Geography

This article attempts a double reflection: a methodological interrogation of myself and an autointerrogation of my methodology. Following Ernst Bloch, I structure this reflection around the idea of traces, which are brief, narrative, aphoristic speculations on a particular theme. In this article, I (re)produce my own narrative traces, engaging with and representing several moments of strangeness in my methodological praxis as they are recorded in field notes from prior fieldwork with urban secession movements in black and white communities of Atlanta. Building from Bloch’s hermeneutic, I treat these moments as traces to be pursued, rather than simple social artifacts of the relational, intersubjective activity of research. Finally, I demonstrate how a geographer might develop that which crystallizes in the interpretation of the trace (i.e., through the intentional reconsideration of the uncanny and recurrent moments of everyday experience) toward the methodological worlding of philosophy as a vibrant, reflexive, human praxis. Key Words: Bloch, interpretation, method, postqualitative analysis, praxis.