A major theme in geographic education is developing a student’s “sense of place”, their connection to the place they are in and their understanding of it. It is a mental connection to what they are working on. Through technology, we are connected to anywhere we want within seconds, which can lead to people being disconnected with their environment. Place based learned seeks to reconnect students with their sense of place and their environment. During my practicum I found that having students both experience their world and map it helped them to understand the world around them. My grade 4/5 students greatly enjoyed working with ArcGIS and using GIS techniques to map Canada.
There are many reasons that place based learning is important and help students develop a sense of place:
“Learning takes students out of the classroom and into the community and natural environment.
Projects have consequences; students' contributions make a difference to environmental quality and to the well-being of communities.
Place-based projects are integrated back into classroom lessons.
Students want to learn in order to apply their knowledge to solving real problems.
Students play an active role in defining and shaping projects.
Students collaborate with local citizens, organizations, agencies, businesses, and government. Working alongside community members, students help make plans that shape the future of their social, physical, and economic environments.
Students are encouraged to view their community as an ecosystem and to understand the relationships and processes necessary to support healthy living.
By mapping their school and its surrounding community, students create visual representations of the systems nested within larger systems that constitute their local place in its wholeness.”
Geography is a passion of mine and I look forward to being able to share my passion for it with my students. There are many reasons to study and explore geography for students in all stages of study. Geography surrounds us in the weather, the streets that bring us to school, it is in the mountains we look at and the rivers we cross. The Canadian Association of Geographers has developed a list of 10 reasons that students should learn geography, they also have many classroom resources available through their magazine Canadian Geographic’s online teacher area.
“Top 10 Reasons to Study Geography 1. To understand basic physical systems that affect everyday life (e.g. earth-sun relationships, water cycles, and wind and ocean currents).
2. To learn the location of places and the physical and cultural characteristics of those places in order to function more effectively in our increasingly interdependent world.
3. To understand the geography of past times and how geography has played important roles in the evolution of people, their ideas, places and environments.
4. To develop a mental map of your community, province or territory, country and the world so that you can understand the “where” of places and events.
5. To explain how the processes of human and physical systems have arranged and sometimes changed the surface of the Earth.
6. To understand the spatial organization of society and see order in what often appears to be random scattering of people and places.
7. To recognize spatial distributions at all scales — local and worldwide — in order to understand the complex connectivity of people and places.
8. To be able to make sensible judgements about matters involving relationships between the physical environment and society.
9. To appreciate Earth as the homeland of humankind and provide insight for wise management decisions about how the planet’s resources should be used.
10. To understand global interdependence and to become a better global citizen.” (Canadian Association of Geographers, 2014)
There are many reasons that place based learning is important and help students develop a sense of place:
“Learning takes students out of the classroom and into the community and natural environment.
Projects have consequences; students' contributions make a difference to environmental quality and to the well-being of communities.
Place-based projects are integrated back into classroom lessons.
Students want to learn in order to apply their knowledge to solving real problems.
Students play an active role in defining and shaping projects.
Students collaborate with local citizens, organizations, agencies, businesses, and government. Working alongside community members, students help make plans that shape the future of their social, physical, and economic environments.
Students are encouraged to view their community as an ecosystem and to understand the relationships and processes necessary to support healthy living.
By mapping their school and its surrounding community, students create visual representations of the systems nested within larger systems that constitute their local place in its wholeness.”
Geography is a passion of mine and I look forward to being able to share my passion for it with my students. There are many reasons to study and explore geography for students in all stages of study. Geography surrounds us in the weather, the streets that bring us to school, it is in the mountains we look at and the rivers we cross. The Canadian Association of Geographers has developed a list of 10 reasons that students should learn geography, they also have many classroom resources available through their magazine Canadian Geographic’s online teacher area.
“Top 10 Reasons to Study Geography 1. To understand basic physical systems that affect everyday life (e.g. earth-sun relationships, water cycles, and wind and ocean currents).
2. To learn the location of places and the physical and cultural characteristics of those places in order to function more effectively in our increasingly interdependent world.
3. To understand the geography of past times and how geography has played important roles in the evolution of people, their ideas, places and environments.
4. To develop a mental map of your community, province or territory, country and the world so that you can understand the “where” of places and events.
5. To explain how the processes of human and physical systems have arranged and sometimes changed the surface of the Earth.
6. To understand the spatial organization of society and see order in what often appears to be random scattering of people and places.
7. To recognize spatial distributions at all scales — local and worldwide — in order to understand the complex connectivity of people and places.
8. To be able to make sensible judgements about matters involving relationships between the physical environment and society.
9. To appreciate Earth as the homeland of humankind and provide insight for wise management decisions about how the planet’s resources should be used.
10. To understand global interdependence and to become a better global citizen.” (Canadian Association of Geographers, 2014)