Making the Connections: Infusing the National Geography Standards into the Classroom

Abstract

How will the National Geography Standards change the way teachers teach? The Standards will provide teachers with a geographic perspective that will enable them to teach improved geography content while building geographic skills and knowledge that will benefit their students for the rest of their lives. By taking a fresh look at the content in the curriculum from a geographic perspective, teachers can make connections between the Geography Standards and our own classrooms. The Standards provide information and strategies for teaching geography. They can be used to create lessons which offer opportunities for students to “do” geography and apply the skills they are learning.     

Challenges of Teaching Advanced Placement Human Geography

Abstract

The new Advanced Placement (AP) human geography course is a wonderful opportunity to ensure the availability of high quality geographic education for high school students. As with any course, in addition to the students' interest and ability, their success is also closely linked to the teachers' preparation. In order to be as well prepared as possible, most AP human geography teachers want and need to know several things in addition to the course content. Questions addressed include how to promote the course, who to promote it to, necessary geographic background for both students and teachers, recommended texts and other resources, how to prepare students for the examination, and how to incorporate the course into the school curriculum.     

The Value of Place Geography in a Commercial Geography Course

Abstract

This article summarizes methods used in a secondary school geography class to interest students in geography through examples drawn from local geography. Instead of relying on examples taken from exotic places to illustrate geographic concepts, the local landscape is used in the classroom to teach students about geography. The article is arranged according to the six essential elements of the National Geography Standards, but it does not imply that the methods presented should be used to teach the standards. Rather, the examples presented are used throughout a course in the geography of North and South America to develop an interest among students and, with examples from the local landscape, to increase student understanding of geographic concepts related to issues presented in the course.     

Activities to Develop a Spatial Perspective Among Students in Introductory Geography Courses

Abstract

Teaching students to gain a spatial perspective is one of the most difficult yet important components of geographic education. This paper presents a series of activities designed to develop a more comprehensive understanding of spatial concepts among students in introductory geography courses. The activities and content are most appropriate for high school or university undergraduate students. An evaluation of these activities demonstrates that they enhance the student's spatial perspective and their understanding of the role of spatial concepts in geography.     

Census 2000 and Geography Education

Abstract

By using stream restoration as a seminar theme, geography faculty can create a topical course that helps provide a shared intellectual agenda for both physical and human geography students, while highlighting the holistic strengths of our discipline. Although it is not necessary that faculty have prior knowledge about the topic, a willingness to work collaboratively is essential to creating an effective course about this complex endeavor. The course can simultaneously meets the needs of students continuing on to graduate studies as well as those preparing for teaching careers. Guidance on how a stream restoration class could be used to teach the eighteen geography standards is also provided.     

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.     

The Geography Course in the Oswego State Normal and Training School

Abstract

This article addresses the knowledge of geography and geography-related careers of sixth and ninth grade students in six Florida schools. For geography knowledge no sex differences were noted for the total sample, ninth grade African American males outperformed African American females, achievement differed by school, and students knew most about skills and least about physical geography Students' career knowledge increased with grade level; males were more knowledgeable than females; African American females were the least knowledgeable; sex-related differences became more pronounced in ninth grade; and the most frequently cited careers were cartographer, explorer, meteorologist, and news person.     

Geography,the Integrating Discipline: Explaining China's Population-Driven Geopolitics to Students

Abstract

This article demonstrates geography's role as an integrative discipline and its utility in connecting students to the world around them. A case study links China's demography and its geopolitics to the lives of U.S. students. The relationship of China's population pressures to its resulting economic growth, need for economic resources, and geopolitical efforts are examined using the concepts and holistic capabilities that are the academic strength of geography.     

Toward a Geography of the Negro in the City

Abstract

The geography of Black America represents a legitimate and a distinctive sub-field of the discipline. While research time and attention is being focused increasingly on Black America much remains to be done to incorporate its study into introductory courses at both the secondary and college levels. Since many existing geography courses are inadequately structured to accommodate a meaningful analysis of Black America, it will be necessary to restructure them so that they become relevant not only to Black America but to emerging world-wide cultural patterns as well. The most logical and efficacious framework for such courses is one focused on the geography of cities. Courses dealing with urban topics can be devised so that major concepts of city structure can be presented as concomitants to topics dealing with the role and the contribution of the Negro in the city.     

Internet-Based GIS in an Inductive Learning Environment: A Case Study of Ninth-Grade Geography Students

Abstract

This article reports the results of a qualitative case study that explored the use of Internet-based geographic information systems (IGIS) with ninth-grade geography students. The students worked in teams to examine the geography of Africa using IGIS resources with the instructional goal of developing a presentation on a significant issue facing one region or country. The purpose of this study was to explore the use of IGIS as a tool for integrating geospatial technologies into ninth-grade geography curriculum and instruction within an inductive learning environment. The findings for this study indicate that IGIS can be a successful tool for geography education in an inductive learning environment. Based on qualitative data collected through classroom observations, focus group interviews with students, student work samples, and a teacher journal, two assertions are offered: students perceived expanded freedom as a positive aspect of this IGIS project and IGIS projects such as this can lead to gains in students' cultural awareness and empathy for distant others.     

The Importance of Geography in Education II

Abstract

The concept of scale is fundamental to geography, yet the definitions for “scale” and related spatial terms can be confusing to those working in other spatial science disciplines. This is particularly true in the emerging multidisciplinary world of integrated remote sensing and geographic information systems, or IGIS's, where data of different types and at various spatial and temporal scales are combined to support complex space-time data analyses. Without a basic lexicon of accepted scale terms, working within an IGIS can breed confusion in the interpretation of data and the models that result from an IGIS construct. This paper provides some terminologies of scale that can be used as a framework for a multidisciplinary lexicon of accepted scaling terms and describes their relationships to an IGIS. It also illustrates how scaling terms can be potentially misunder stood when applied to geographic techniques that are used in disciplines related to geography.     

Some Suggestions Concerning a Course of Study in Geography

Abstract

Over the next decade or so, the National Assessment for Educational Progress in Geography and the Geographic Education Standards Project promise to give geography a new definition as a school subject. This will challenge the educational community to re-examine how geography is taught and learned across all the grade levels, K-12. If geography is to be perceived as an essential subject in preparing students for citizenship as adults, not only must its image change, but its content and the pedagogy that delivers it must be modified as well. To achieve those ends, new curricular models grounded in cogent and applicable research must develop through partnerships of teachers, teacher educators, learning theorists, and professional geographers.     

Geography and Politics of the United States in the Year 2000

Abstract

The future as a productive subject of scholarly inquiry has only recently been recognized by geographers. The discipline's concern with man's spatial behavior and structure in a social, economic, and political vein suggests that teaching, research, and planning efforts can be funneled in these directions. Predicting future events and processes in the social sciences and in most areas of geography is difficult, probably more so in political geography than in many other fields. For this reason studies of a political nature represent a ready challenge and opportunity to examine present political worlds and suggest the likelihood of future political events, problems, and processes. This study, which focuses on the United States, identifies six developments and characteristics that are expected to be representative of the nation's political geography by the year 2000. Specifically, it is believed that by that date boundaries will have less meaning, the city will become the focus of political attention (as opposed to the state), new political cultures will emerge accompanied by new voting patterns, centralized authority at the national level will continue, and political considerations will play a key role in environmental planning and protection.     

Certain Persistent Errors in Geography

Abstract

Reform in geography education, as reflected in Geography for Life: National Geography Standards (1994) for the U.S.A., favors a constructivist approach to learning. This study examines the acceptance of this approach among students in two upper secondary schools in China. A lesson was developed to illustrate interactive problem solving methods. The students reacted positively to the lesson. The instructional practices stimulating their response and the potential for problem solving geography educational methods in China are discussed.     

The Use of Literary Works in Teaching Latin American Geography

Abstract

Properly selected literary works can spark student interest in regional geography. Since evidence is mounting that reading levels of students are continuously declining, special attention may be needed to draw students to books. Whereas a textbook, even a well-written one, may fail to hold a student's attention or stimulate him to attempt further reading, an exciting and informative novel may produce the desired response. Students can learn to appreciate the practical application of traditional geographic writing and instruction through the instructor's careful integration of course themes with the pseudo-real-life plots of fiction or the true-life situations recounted in biographical works or travel accounts.     

The Geography

Editor's Note: The views and opinions expressed in the following paper have been written in the form of a letter or conversation between a dissertation advisor and an advanced graduate student in medical geography. It emphasizes the pervasive qualities of the health component of human behavior, and hopefully transmits aspects of human behavior that are taking hold in medical-ecological research. It attempts to suggest what at least one practicing medical geographer thinks a major facet of the field will be like as it matures. The holistic perspective that it envisages seems to be taking hold in neighboring disciplines—or perhaps “interdisciplines”as they might someday be called. The speculative quality of the presentation is intended to serve as a possible springboard for professional interaction.     

Multimedia Guided Writing Modules for Introductory Human Geography

Abstract

This article describes a pilot project initiated in the fall term of 1993 that implemented and tested an interactive system of multimedia computer learning modules for an introductory human geography course. Modules actively involved students in learning and collaborative writing about topics illustrative of the breadth of contemporary human geography. Evaluation was achieved by means of analysis of student essays, electronic logs of student time spent in various portions of the system, and a comprehensive survey administered to students at the end of the term. This information suggests that the use of interactive multimedia lab modules can greatly enrich the learning environment for a wide range of students taking introductory human geography courses, though careful attention must be paid to ensure ease of use. The modules are now being refined based on these results; our hope is to make them available to other geography departments in the near future.     

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.