April 2014

GeoLearning
Thoughts on Geography and Education
By Daniel C. Edelson, Vice President for Education,
National Geographic Society

Table of Contents
3 Defining Geography for Education
3

Geographers' Geography

The Popular Perception of Geography

School Geography

7 Connecting Schoolchildren to the Real World?

That's Extraordinary!
7

The Goodwillie Environmental School

Bank Street School for Children

An Underlying Lesson for Education

26 A Role for Old-Fashioned Geographia in

Education
29 The Challenge of Defining Geo-Literacy
32 Scaling Up Classroom Maps
35 TricordersThe Next Tool for Geographic
Learning?
38 Back to School with Geo-Literacy
40 More Information

10 Charting a Path for Precollege Geography

Education in the United States

41 GeoMentors Make a Difference

13 Using GIS to Explain Geographic Reasoning

44 A Revolution in Geographic Education: Virginia's

Geospatial Semester

17 Break-the-Mold Approaches to Geography

Learning

47 The Importance of Innovation in Teaching

21 Geo-Education: Preparation for 21st-Century

Decisions

50 Get Involved with Geo-Education Reform

54 Geographic Literacy in U.S. by 2025

23 Unlocking the Educational Potential of Citizen

Science

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Defining Geography for Education

Odds are that if I ask you and the person in the next office to

definitions "geographers' geography," "the popular perception

describe the field of geography, I will get pretty different answers.

of geography," and "school geography."

And if I were to ask other members of your familyyour mother,

your brother, your spouseI would get an even broader range
of answers. And if I were to ask the people next to you on your
morning commute, the answers would be more diverse still.

Before I go on, I should note that these definitions are all specific
to the United States. From talking to geography educators
from other parts of the world, I believe that these clusters exist
elsewhere, but I have also learned that the specific definitions in

This diversity is, of course, an inherent property of human

each cluster and the similarities of the clusters to each other differ

psychology. We all carry around our own personal understanding

from place to place.

of words and concepts that result from our own particular set of
experiences.

Geographers' Geography

In most cases, the fact that there is such a broad range of

While there can be no "correct" definition of a field, the cluster

definitions for the field of geography isn't a problem, but there

of definitions that I think of as geographers' geography has

is one place where it is a serious issuein conversations about

a status that sets it apart from the others. It reflects the way

geography education.

experts and practitioners in geography think of their field.

In more than a decade of talking to people about how to improve

geography education, I have learned that it is important to be
explicit about the definition of geography that I am using.

Because geographers' definitions of geography are the product

of academic study and discussion, they cluster around a set of
conventional definitions, including geography as the study of
place and space and geography as the study of spatial patterns

While there are, of course, as many definitions of geography as

and processes at the earth's surface. Geographers also commonly

there are people, there are three clusters that are important for

describe geography as encompassing human geography,

discussions about geography education. I call these clusters of

physical geography, and human-environment interaction.

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Defining Geography for Education

Unlike nongeographers, who often define maps, mapmaking, and

Most people I talk to consider map reading and wayfinding

map interpretation as the defining characteristics of geography,

to be the only skills that geography teaches, and if they are

geographers tend to talk about maps as being instrumental

aware that one can study geography at an advanced level or

to geography but not the defining feature. In my experience,

practice geography professionally, they believe the focus of that

geographers describe maps as tools that they use to understand

geography is mapmaking.

and communicate about space and place.

From the perspective of geography education, the popular

The benefit of being able to refer to geographers' definitions of

perception of geography is as pernicious as it is widespread.

geography in discussions about education is that they make it

People are increasingly aware that factual knowledge is of limited

easy to describe the specific advantages of geography in contrast

value in the Internet age, so it is difficult to have a productive

to other subjects of study, and they highlight the societal goals

conversation about the value of geography education with

that geographic understanding and practices support. It is easy

someone who believes geography is about factual understanding

to connect geographers' geography to the myriad activities of

and thinks its usefulness for careers is limited to the obscure

commerce, government, and community life.

profession of cartography. Unfortunately, it can be very difficult

to change this perception of geography, especially in a single

The Popular Perception of Geography

Unfortunately, the popular perception of geography is very
different. I find the understanding of geography that I encounter

conversation, when the individual has had no personal exposure

to systematic geographic reasoning or problem solving.

on a daily basis to fit the stereotype that geographers refer to

School Geography

as "place-name and location" geography frighteningly often.

The third cluster of definitions I encounter is what I call "school

Most people I encounter, regardless of their level of educational

geography." This is what is taught in schools under the label of

attainment, view geography as a body of discrete knowledge

geography. School geography is typically a little broader than the

about the world that includes names and locations of countries,

popular perception of geography but dramatically narrower than

cities, bodies of water, and major geological features and facts

geographers' geography.

about those places.

In the United States, the overwhelming distinction between

school geography and geographers' geography is that school

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Defining Geography for Education

geography focuses almost exclusively on human geography. To

education. It leaves out the critical component of physical

the extent that physical geography is taught as geography in the

geography and makes it difficult to talk about the study of

United States, it is taught as background and context for human

human-environment interaction. Likewise, the focus on factual

geography. This is not to say that physical geography is not

knowledge makes it hard to make the case of the importance of

taught in American schools. Some physical geography is taught,

geography education in our modern world.

but it is taught under the labels of earth science, environmental

science, and geoscience rather than geography. Anything that
is taught with the label geography is taught as part of the social
studies curriculum and focuses on the geography of people.

The bottom line here is that the differences between these

definitions represent both a challenge and an opportunity. The
challenge is that it is very difficult to have productive discussions
about improving geography education when the participants

The second characteristic of school geography is that it focuses

in these conversations have definitions that are limited to either

primarily on factual knowledge. It would not be fair to modern

the popular perception of geography or the school definition of

curriculum designers, textbook authors, or teachers to say that

geography.

geography education today focuses exclusively on facts, but it is

fair to say that school geography is so dominated by the teaching
of facts that it has not done anything to change the popular
perception of geography as being about knowledge of discrete
facts.

On the other hand, it exposes an opportunity in the form of a

specific issue to work on. If we could bring the geographers'
definition of geography to a larger audience, it could make it
much easier to bring about change in geography education.
While it is difficult (I can't count the number of times when I

Geographers and geography educators have worked hard

have explained to people what I mean by geography, only to

to change the definition of school geography through the

have them revert to their old understanding of geography a

development and dissemination of standards that reflect the

few minutes later), people can learn new definitions. It requires

subset of geographers' geography they believe K12 students

deliberate effort and clever communications strategies, but it

should learn. However, the impact of these efforts on the

can be done. In fact, I believe that it must be done if we ever

geography that is taught in schools is still limited.

are to make significant progress on the challenges of improving

Like the popular definition of geography, the school definition

geography education and geographic literacy.

of geography is a problem for conversations about geography

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Defining Geography for Education

For more information about the efforts that the National

Geographic Society, the Association of American Geographers,
the National Council for Geographic Education, and Esri are
making to increase popular understanding of geography, visit
GeographyAwarenessWeek.org.
(This article originally appeared in the Winter 2013/2014 issue of ArcNews.)

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Defining Geography for Education

Connecting Schoolchildren to the Real

World? That's Extraordinary!
One of the perks of my job is that I get to visit extraordinary

become the default practice in modern schools. Instead, they

schools and classrooms. It is rare that I don't find a school visit to

develop conceptual understanding through experience over

be inspiring, but over the years, I have seen a couple of places

an extended period of time. Given the choice between having

that really stand out. They are so inspiring that I have used

young people acquire large quantities of knowledge in short

each of them as an example in presentations and conversations

periods of time or developing conceptual understanding over

hundreds of times, but I still want to share them more broadly.

extended periods, which do you think will be most valuable to

Why do I find them so inspiring?

them and their communities in the long run? For me, there is no
question.

First, in a world where people have come to associate excellent

teaching with heroic effort, these examples show what can be
done through simple, commonsensical activities that any teacher
can do with ordinary levels of training and resources.

The Goodwillie Environmental School

The first example is a school just outside Grand Rapids, Michigan,
that I visited seven or eight years ago, but I remember like it was

Second, they involve establishing meaningful connections

yesterday. Called the Goodwillie Environmental School, it is a

between students and the world outside of school. I often say

magnet middle school on a 28-acre plot of mostly wooded land.

that we have designed schools and schooling to be optimal for

Here are a few of the facts about the school that made such an

learning to read, write, and do math, but they couldn't be worse

impression on me:

environments for studying the real world. Both of these examples

overcome the limitations of modern schools to enable students
to study the real world.
Finally, they do not seek to fill students' minds with as much
knowledge as they can in a short period of time, which has

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Every day, the buses let the students off on the opposite side of
the property from the school building, and the students walk a
half-mile through the woods to the school building.
The students eat lunch outside every day all year, rain, snow, or
shine, unless there is lightning or a dangerous storm.

Connecting Schoolchildren to the Real World? That's Extraordinary!

At the beginning of the year, every student identifies his or her

The most important parts of their study are the firsthand

own spot in the woods. Every student spends at least 30 minutes,

observations and interviews of adults. Students travel the two

at least once a week, in that location, observing and recording

blocks from their school to the river on multiple occasions

in words and pictures what they see, hear, smell, and feel in a

throughout the year to observe what takes place in, on, and

phenology ("seasonal change") journal.

around it. They plan and conduct interviews of people who work

Every aspect of the curriculum is tied to environmental themes,

and the temperature in the school is kept at 65 degrees F during

on or near the river as well as experts in the history and science

of the river.

the colder months to make it easy to transition from inside to

This study is wonderful on its own, but what makes it such a

outside throughout the day.

fabulous example of excellent teaching is what the students do

Since many students wear fleece and hats throughout the day,
one of the school's slogans is "hat hair is cool," and there are no
mirrors in the bathrooms.

with what they learn. Over the course of the school year, they
build a physical model of all the aspects of the river on a tabletop
measuring approximately 15 feet long and 3 feet wide.
The students create their model out of everyday materials, adding

Bank Street School for Children

The second example is very different on the surface and nearly
identical in concept. This one is found in the heart of New York
City at Broadway and 112th Street. It is a program at the Bank
Street School for Children, an independent school that is part of
Bank Street College.
They have many wonderful programs at the School for Children,
but the one that captured my imagination is a project focusing
on the Hudson River that is conducted in second grade. In this
project, the students in each class collaborate on a study of all
aspects of the river through firsthand observation, interviews with
adults, and consultation of primary and secondary sources.

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to it bit by bit, as they learn new things. When I visited in March,

the model was extensive. It included a papier-mach hill on one
end, representing the headwaters of the river in the Adirondacks,
and butcher paper painted blue at the other, representing the
bay past the tip of Manhattan. In between was a 1.5- to 2-footwide, blue-painted river with boats on it; bridges across it; and all
kinds of signs, buildings, people, and vehicles on either bank.
Through serious discussion and debate, the students had
determined what to build and how to build everything in their
model. They had designed ferry landings and built ferry boats,
which they could move from one side of the river to the other in a
simulation of their daily schedule. Soon before my visit, they had

Connecting Schoolchildren to the Real World? That's Extraordinary!

been learning about pollution in the river, and so there were also

connections to natural cycles. Making this happen doesn't require

freshly made signs along the banks requesting that people not

a heroic effort, just a change in priorities and approach.

litter.

(This article originally appeared in the Fall 2013 issue of ArcNews.)

Since this is second grade, the students were allowed to play

with the objects in their model during lunch and recess, but the
rest of the time the model was reserved for serious building and
simulation.
I was intrigued to learn that the students were just about to
start studying the history of the river, which they were going
to learn in reverse chronological order. The teacher explained
that as they went backwards through history, they would start
removing elements from their model in a step-by-step process
that would leave the river and its surroundings in a pristine state,
representing the time before humans settled in the watershed.

An Underlying Lesson for Education

As I said before, I find these inspirational because they are
simple, connect students to the real world, and develop real
understanding, but I also believe they have a deeper lesson for
good geoeducation. Young people will do amazing things when
we ignore our usual expectations about what is appropriate
for them and what they are capable of. Second graders will
conduct sophisticated interviews of adults and create functional
models and simulations. Middle school students will suspend
their concerns about physical appearance and will develop deep

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Connecting Schoolchildren to the Real World? That's Extraordinary!

Charting a Path for Precollege Geography

Education in the United States
The problems of education can seem intractable, but four

an appendix. In the second edition, GIS figures very prominently

organizations have been working together to improve geography

in the section of standards called "The Earth in Spatial Terms."

education in the United States for more than 30 years, and

they continue to do so. These organizationsthe Association
of American Geographers (AAG), the National Council for
Geographic Education (NCGE), the American Geographical
Society (AGS), and the National Geographic Societyhave
recently recommitted themselves to this important work through
the publication of several landmark documents.
The first of these is a major revision to Geography for Life:
National Geography Standards. Geography for Life lays out
learning goals for geography in three grade bands: K4 (ages
510), 58 (ages 1014), and 912 (ages 1418). These goals
represent a consensus among geographers and geography
educators of what geographically informed individuals should
know and be able to do with their knowledge.
First published in 1994, Geography for Life has been thoroughly
revised to bring it up-to-date with the state of geography and
of research on education. For example, when the first edition of
Geography for Life was published, GIS only merited a mention in

While the federal government in the United States does not

adopt or endorse educational standards, Geography for Life
carries the weight of the four national geography organizations.
The organizations created the standards to provide guidance
to state and local educational agencies in the creation of their
educational standards and curriculum programs.
Around the time that the second edition of Geography for Life
was going into final edits, the four geography organizations,
which collaborate on education initiatives under the auspices
of the Geography Education National Implementation Project
(GENIP), began discussing how to ramp up the speed and
increase the reach of their collective efforts.
The result of these discussions was a proposal to the National
Science Foundation to create a set of strategic plans for the
improvement of geography education over a 5- to 10-year
timeline. The organizations declared that it was time to create "a
road map for geography education in the 21st century" and, with
the support of the National Science Foundation, launched into an
intensive 24-month research and planning project. The resultant

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Charting a Path for Precollege Geography Education in the United States

10

road map, which lays out a path to the effective implementation

for how to improve the effectiveness of geography education

of the learning objectives detailed in Geography for Life, was

in three areas that the geography organizations identified as

released this spring in the form of three topically focused reports.

being important levers for change: instructional materials and

The work of the Road Map Project was conducted by three

committees composed of leading geographers, educators, and

professional development for teachers, assessment of student

progress, and research on learning and teaching.

researchers in the science of learning who were selected by a

The committees conducted a review of current practices and

leadership committee representing the four organizations. The

current research in their assigned area and then formulated

committees were charged with creating recommendations

recommendations for how to improve geography education over

the next decade through focused work in their area.
The Instructional Materials and Professional Development
Committee considered the current state of the instructional
materials for teaching geography and the preservice and
in-service education that teachers who are responsible for
geography education receive. Based on this analysis and a review
of the literature, the committee formulated recommendations
and guidelines for both instructional materials and professional
development that will lead to improvements in instruction and in
learning outcomes.
The Assessment Committee studied the current state of
assessment in geography and reviewed its history. Based on the
analysis of existing practices and a review of the literature on
assessment as a support for improving educational outcomes,
the committee formulated guidelines for developing assessment

A road map, which lays out a path to the effective implementation of the
learning objectives detailed in Geography for Life, was released in the form
of three topically focused reports.

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instruments and for conducting assessment that will lead to

improvements in instruction and outcomes.

Charting a Path for Precollege Geography Education in the United States

11

The Geography Education Research Committee reviewed the

For more information, Geography for Life can be viewed online.

existing education and cognitive science research literature

The print edition can be purchased from the National Council for

to identify gaps in our ability to answer significant questions

Geographic Education online store. The reports of The Road Map

about geography education based on research. Drawing on

for 21st Century Geography Education Project and executive

this analysis, the committee formulated recommendations for

summaries are available at no charge.

research questions and approaches that will build a knowledge

base to guide improvement efforts for geography education in

(This article originally appeared in the Summer 2013 issue of ArcNews.)

the future.
The result is a set of specific recommendations to improve
geography education over the next decade that is grounded in
the most comprehensive study of geography education that has
been conducted in the United States. It is, in fact, a road map for
achieving the goals laid out in Geography for Life that the four
members of GENIP are committed to implementing over the
course of the coming decade.
Achieving the goals of Geography for Life will require a greater
public commitment to geography education and the allocation of
more funding than we have seen before in the United States. By
creating the road map, the geography education community has
provided a strong justification for making that commitment and
described how those resources can be used most effectively.
The next step in this process is to bring these landmark
documents to the attention of policy makers, funders, and
educators who are in a position to act on their recommendations.
To assist with this effort, contact any of the GENIP organizations.

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Using GIS to Explain Geographic Reasoning

I began the winding path that has become a career, as a
researcher in artificial intelligence. I was drawn to artificial
intelligence by one of its central tenets: you can understand how
the human mind works by trying to reproduce its behaviors in the
form of a computer program.
I was musing about that recently as I found myself using what GIS
software does while trying to explain to someone what I mean by
"geographic reasoning." As I've written before in this space, one
of my biggest challenges as an advocate for improved geography
education is explaining what geography is really about.
Since most people tend to associate geography with factual
knowledge, I want to be able to broaden their understanding
of geography by explaining geographic reasoning to them.
However, I've struggled to find descriptions of geographic
reasoning that are helpful when talking to people who haven't
studied geography.
What I've found are two kinds of descriptions of geographic
reasoning. One characterizes geographic reasoning using terms
and examples that only other geographers can understand. The
other is frustratingly circular: geographic reasoning is what
geographers do to understand the world; geographic reasoning

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Using GIS to Explain Geographic Reasoning

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consists of asking geographic questions, gathering and analyzing

geographic information, and constructing geographic
explanations; geographic reasoning is the process of constructing
explanations and predictions about place and location.
There is no shortage of examples of geographic reasoning. John
Snow's discovery of the source of the 1854 cholera outbreak in
London immediately comes to mind. However, it's hard to see
what the underlying reasoning is in individual examples.
However, as I was leafing through Andy Mitchell's Esri Guide to
GIS Analysis at the User Conference this summer, I had a flash
of insight. The table of contents of that wonderful three-volume
guide to GIS can be read as an overview of geographic reasoning.
Consider the following:
Measuring geographic distributions
Identifying patterns

However, the outcome here is the same as the one that many

Identifying clusters

researchers in artificial intelligence seek.

Analyzing geographic relationships

Over the course of the last 50 years, GIS software developers

This list happens to be the main chapters in the second volume

of Mitchell's series, but to me it reads like a clear list of the core
components of geographic reasoning. I assume that Mitchell did
not sit down to identify the conceptual categories of geographic
reasoning. Presumably, he set out to create a well-organized
overview of what you can do with sophisticated GIS software.

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set out to create a set of productivity-enhancing tools to support

geographic reasoning. Over time, they increasingly externalized
geographic reasoning in the software, so that when a modern
instructor sets out to teach someone how to use GIS, what they
are essentially doing is providing an overview of geographic
reasoning.

Using GIS to Explain Geographic Reasoning

14

The hidden benefit of GIS, therefore, is that GIS software has

come to embody geographic reasoning to the point where the
best way to explain to someone what geographic reasoning
consists of may be to demonstrate to them what you can do with
GIS.
Want to introduce younger children to geographic reasoning?
How about using the following as a progression?
1. Mapping where things are
2. Mapping the most and least
3. Mapping density
4. Finding what's inside
5. Finding what's nearby
6. Mapping change
Ready to teach advanced students about sophisticated forms of
geographic reasoning? What about these?
7. Finding suitable locations
8. Rating suitable locations
9. Modeling paths
10. Modeling flow

It will come as no surprise that I lifted the first list from the
table of contents of volume 1 and the second from volume 3 of
Mitchell's series.

11. Modeling interaction

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Using GIS to Explain Geographic Reasoning

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So the next time someone asks me what's valuable about

geography education, I won't turn to John Snow and the
19th century. I will tell them about identifying patterns and
clusters or modeling paths and flow.
(This article originally appeared in the Spring 2013 issue of ArcNews.)

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Break-the-Mold Approaches to Geography Learning

Before you read this column, I want you to pause for a moment to

There are a small number of people out there, however, who

consider the following question: How could we make geography

summon up very different images when they think about

learning more enjoyable for young people?

geography learning. Maybe they never experienced traditional

My nonscientific research indicates that about 1 percent of the

general public enjoy learning geography so much that they
cannot imagine a way to make it more enjoyable (you know
who you are). The rest of us tend to generate ideas like making
geography learning into a game, making it more relevant, or
adding rewards.
I don't think people's answers to the question are nearly as
interesting as what flashes into their minds when asked to
think about geography learning. My nonscientific research on
this reveals that most of us picture very traditional classroom
activities: memorizing place-names and locations, learning
to interpret maps, reading about foreign cultures, analyzing
population pyramids, and tracing migration paths. Two things

geography education, or maybe they experienced it and have

completely rejected it as a model for learning. They envision
activities that feel both relevant and enjoyable. These are
the people we need to find and listen to, because they don't
think about improving geography education by incrementally
improving traditional approaches. They think about completely
new approaches to geography teaching and learning.
One place where you can find people like that is in the
Geography Collective, a group of innovative thinkers in the
United Kingdom. They describe themselves in the following way:
"We are a collective of geography activists, teachers, therapists,
academics, artists, and guerrillas. We've come together to
encourage [young] people to see our world in new ways."

tend to characterize that image: it doesn't feel relevant or useful

The members of the Geography Collective characterize

to the learner, and it doesn't feel inherently enjoyable. So when

themselves as "guerrilla geographers," and their goal is to

we think about improving geography learning, we think about

engage others in guerrilla geography. By their definition,

how we can change those experiences.

guerrilla geography consists of "operations carried out by small,

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The Geography Collective's Mission:Explore website.

independent geographers to cause thought [and] connected

groups behind public lines or in occupied spaces. . . . Guerrilla

thinking, stimulate the public, and to wear down public

geography is irregular [direct action] educating."

resistance to geography, usually carried on by a number of small

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Its approach to engaging people in guerrilla geography is

encouraged to explore their surroundings and express their own

through a set of miniadventures that are designed for young

opinions about the positive and negative aspects of different

people to do by themselves or with adults. These adventuresor

spaces. Another is that they should recognize their own role

"missions," as the Geography Collective calls themencourage

in shaping the world. Underlying all of what the Geography

exploration. They challenge participants to explore either new or

Collective does is the goal of teaching geography as a method

familiar places with new perspectives.

for observing the world and deciding how to act in it.

These missions are always quirky and often have a sense of

The Geography Collective does not position its approach to

playful mischief about them. One mission asks explorers to

geography learning in opposition to traditional geography or

locate places where one neighborhood ends and another begins

even as an alternative. It presents its approach as providing an

and then explain how they know. Another asks them to "go

additional set of experiences that are disappearing from the

outdoors in search of the most beautiful poo you can find [it's

modern world, where children are taught that all the interesting

a kid thing]. When you discover it, take a picture of it." A third

things in the world have already been discovered and adults

asks them to explore the world from a bug's-eye view by taking

believe it's more important to protect young people from the

macrophotographs. And a fourth, called Avoid Seeing Red,

hazards of the world around them than to give them the chance

instructs explorers, "If you see red, shield your eyes, look irritated,

to explore it.

and walk in another direction."

The Geography Collective is one of the most creative groups in

The Geography Collective shares its missions with children,

geography education today, and every time I learn more about

parents, and educators through a series of books and a website,

its work, I get more excited about it. However, I do find myself

Mission:Explore. The website offers points for completing

wishing that creative approaches to geography teaching and

missions and allows explorers to collect points toward "badges"

learning were not so unusual. This is just one transformative

as rewards.

approach to geography learning, and it is not going to resonate

Behind the playfulness and quirkiness of the Geography

Collective's missions are carefully considered philosophical
and educational stances. One is that young people should be

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with everyone. Where the Geography Collective's approach is

quirky and playful, others might be practical and seriousbut
equally effective and motivating to learners.

Break-the-Mold Approaches to Geography Learning

19

I can't help feeling that truly creative approaches to geography

learning are discouragingly few and far between right now. Too
few people are even thinking about geography education, and
those who are still focus too much on incremental improvements
rather than entirely new approaches. We should take the
Geography Collective members and others like them as
inspiration. We must challenge ourselves to think more creatively
and seek out and promote the creative ideas of others.
(This article originally appeared in the Fall 2012 issue of ArcNews.)

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Geo-Education: Preparation for 21st-Century Decisions

Geo-education is about preparing people to make the important

the cascading consequences of actions that result from systems

decisions we will all face in the 21st century. At National

interactions and interconnections among people and places. It

Geographic, we call people who are prepared to make these

also means being able to weigh costs and benefits for oneself, for

decisions geo-literate.

one's community, and for other people and places when making

Geo-literacy requires three kinds of understanding:

InteractionsA geo-literate individual understands that the
world is composed of interacting systems that move and
transform resources. These may be social systems, like political,

decisions.
More important than what it requires is what geo-literacy enables
you to do. Here are six categories of critical decisions that geoliteracy prepares people to make:

economic, and cultural systems. They may be technological

Community lifeA geo-literate individual understands the

systems, like transportation, energy transmission, and

factors that improve or degrade the quality of life in a community.

communications systems. Or they may be environmental systems,

These factors include everything from walkability to cultural

like hydrological, atmospheric, and ecological systems.

resources to housing stock. A geo-literate individual is able to

InterconnectionsA geo-literate individual understands that

these systems connect people and places to each other. This
means that events that happen in one location affect other

use that understanding to (1) make good personal choices about

where to live and spend time, and (2) make good civic choices
about how to improve the quality of life in his or her community.

people and places. It also means that our actions affect other

Location and transportationA geo-literate individual is

people and places.

able to reason through problems involving site selection and

ImplicationsA geo-literate individual is able to use his or her

understanding of interactions and interconnections to make
well-reasoned decisions. This means being able to anticipate

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transportation planning. These problems come up in personal,

professional, and civic life, but they are particularly important in
professional life in the modern world. Individuals with geospatial
reasoning skills are in high demand in fields as diverse as military

Geo-Education: Preparation for 21st-Century Decisions

21

logistics, intelligence, natural resources management, and

and environmental restoration. Whether one is taking action

supply-chain management.

oneself or providing financial support, it is important to be able

Interactions across culturesOur local communities are

increasingly diverse, and our daily lives increasingly involve

to make informed decisions about what actions are most likely to

have a meaningful and lasting impact. This requires geo-literacy.

interactions with people in faraway places. Both of these trends

The challenge of geo-education is weaving the knowledge and

make it important that members of our society be culturally

reasoning skills required to make these six categories of critical

literate, meaning able to communicate and collaborate effectively

decisions into the written curriculum of schools and the unwritten

with individuals from different cultures.

curriculum of home and community life. This is a challenge that

Environmental and social impactsBoth the connections that

knit together our world ever more tightly and the growth in our
global population mean that the impacts of our actions on the
environment and on other people are amplified. This makes it all

we have not yet taken on explicitly in our modern society, but we

must all take it on if we are to prepare today's youth for the world
they will inherit.
(This article originally appeared in the Summer 2012 issue of ArcNews.)

the more important that we all be able to anticipate the potential

environmental and social impacts of our actions and make
decisions accordingly.
Global affairsWhile most individuals' direct influence on global
affairs is limited, people throughout the world have growing
opportunities to shape global affairs through participation
in political processes and public opinion. So geo-literacy is
important to be able to participate in the public debate about
trade, diplomacy, military action, and foreign aid.
Acts of caringBy "acts of caring," I mean actions to improve
the lives of other people or care for the world that we share. This
includes efforts to alleviate poverty, reduce hunger, or improve
health care and education. It also includes wildlife conservation

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22

Unlocking the Educational Potential of Citizen Science

I have been a fan of citizen science for many years, but I do not

opportunity to obtain a quantity and geographic range of data

think the citizen science movement has had the educational

that would not be practical through any other mechanism. They

impact that it could. Citizen science is the name for scientific

are also a boon to participants, who get to join a community;

research projects that engage members of the public in some

participate in something meaningful; and, in many cases, learn

aspect of their research. There have been some high-profile

some new science.

citizen science projects recently in which members of the public

have conducted image analysis and solved protein-folding
problems, but the overwhelming majority of citizen science
projects involve crowdsourced data collection.

For as long as I've known about them, I've been fascinated by the
educational possibilities of community geography projects. I'm
a big believer in both inquiry-based learning and breaking down
the boundaries between school and the real world. Community

For example, some of the largest and longest-running citizen

geography does bothexcept for one thing. Collecting data

science projects are in ornithology. In projects like the National

is only one part of the scientific process, and most community

Audubon Society's Christmas Bird Count and the British Trust

geography projects only engage participants in data collection.

for Ornithology's Garden Birdwatch, birders contribute their

observations to databases that scientists use to track trends in
bird populations and species distributions.

In the stereotypical community geography project, participants

take measurements or record observations and submit them
to a central database for scientists to analyze. In some cases,

These two projects, like many others, fall into a category of citizen

participants are able to see a map of the data that has been

science project that I call community geography. In community

submitted or see results of previous analyses that have been

geography projects, the data is georeferenced and used for

conducted by scientists. However, it is very rare that participants

spatial analysis.

have a chance to create and interpret visualizations or analyze

Community geography projects can be a boon for researchers.

data themselves.

Volunteer data collectors provide investigators with the

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Unlocking the Educational Potential of Citizen Science

23

After talking to organizers of community geography projects,

This has required that we create easy-to-use interfaces and offer

I've learned that most of them would prefer to provide their

users a set of analytic tools that are either familiar or easy for a

participants with opportunities to work with the data, but they

novice to grasp.

lack the resources or expertise to create tools that would enable

their participants to do their own visualization or analysis.

One of the first FieldScope projects that we deployed is

dedicated to studying water quality in the tributaries to the

So, a few years ago, National Geographicwith support from

Chesapeake Bay. Working together with environmental educators

Esri and othersset out to create a web-based platform for

throughout the Chesapeake Bay watershed, we identified

community geography that would provide participants with the

a set of water quality measurements that could be done by

ability to visualize and analyze their own data using GIS. We call

students and teachers across a wide range of grades, and we

this platform FieldScope. The idea behind FieldScope is that it

created a FieldScope application that displays not just student-

is designed specifically to support citizen scientistsindividuals

collected water quality data but also a wide variety of data

who are interested and invested in researching a specific scientific

layers describing the land in the watershed, including land use,

question but who lack the training or technical skills of a scientist.

impermeability, and nitrogen yield.

We also provided users with analysis tools that enable them to
create time plots and scatterplots for the data that they have
collected, and we implemented a set of hydrologic analysis tools
that will help them understand the underlying dynamics of the
watershed. For example, we have provided users with a flow path
tool that allows them to click anywhere in the watershed and see
the path that water will flow from that point to the bay. Users
might employ this tool to see the portion of the river system that
would be affected by a point source of pollution.
This Chesapeake water quality project has proved very popular in
public schools; in the two years that it has been active, more than

A FieldScope map from the Chesapeake Water Quality Project showing a

student's water quality measurement.

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600 teachers have received training on the software, and we have

Unlocking the Educational Potential of Citizen Science

24

recorded more than 40,000 visits to the site. It is also succeeding

important learning outcomes for both science understanding and

in engaging users in analysis. In the first three quarters of 2011,

science skills.

we recorded more than 75,000 geoprocessing events and more

than 45,000 uses of the query tools.
In the 201112 school year, both Fairfax County, Virginia, and
Anne Arundel County, Maryland, have incorporated the project
into their science curricula for all middle school students.
With support from the National Science Foundation, we are
currently in the process of expanding FieldScope's functionality
and creating authoring tools that will enable the broadest
possible community of citizen science projects to build

Our goal over the next few years is to bring this powerful
educational experience to as broad an audience as possible,
young and old, in school and out.
For more information about National Geographic FieldScope and
the Community Geography Initiative, visit natgeoed.org
/fieldscope.
Read other articles in the GeoLearning series.
(This article originally appeared in the Spring 2012 issue of ArcNews.)

FieldScope applications for their own users. This spring, we will

be launching FieldScope applications for two national community
geography projects: Project BudBurst, which is studying
plant phenology, and Frogwatch, USA, which is studying the
distribution of amphibian species.
FieldScope, with its carefully designed user interface and
specially selected GIS tools, is beginning to unlock the potential
of citizen science as a learning experience. Teachers and students
have responded enthusiastically to the opportunity to participate
in geospatial analysis of data. In part, their enthusiasm stems
from the fact that it's data about their own community that they
helped collect. Administrators, in turn, are seeing that the entire
experience of community geography is enabling them to achieve

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Unlocking the Educational Potential of Citizen Science

25

A Role for Old-Fashioned Geographia in Education

The word geography comes from the Greek geographia, which

First, the environment they live in is increasingly circumscribed.

means "writing or describing the world." I frequently hear people

Middle-class youth in our society live largely in enclosed, interior

say that the word geography is outdated because modern

spaces. When they need to travel through external spaces, they

geography is about much more than just describing the world.

tend to do so in enclosed vehicles that are piloted by an adult.

I tend to be sympathetic to that view because I believe that

the power of modern geography is in its approaches to solving
problems and answering questions. However, I think that
describing the world is an essential component of geography,
and it should have a central part in geography education.
I have been thinking about this a lot lately because I have been
thinking about the challenges of teaching young people about
human impacts on the environment. I have become convinced
that the biggest challenge in teaching about the environment is
students' lack of familiarity with their environment. How do you
teach children about changes to the environment if they do not
know what the environment is currently like?
But how, you might ask, is it possible to not be familiar with one's
environment? In the modern world, there are two ways in which
children are unfamiliar with their environment.

Today's typical K12 students go to school in a car or bus that

picks them up very close to their homes and delivers them to the
front door of their schools. They typically spend their afternoons
in their school or another building, which they are transported
to, again, in a bus or a car, until they return home by the same
modes of transportation.
Second, they have little opportunity or motivation to notice their
environments. They are isolated from the external environment
by various forms of cocoon, and they are not responsible for
navigating by themselves, protecting themselves, or caring for
any aspect of the environment.
I do not want to romanticize the past, but I do want to point out
that only two generations ago, most Americans still depended
directly on their environment for their livelihood and were not
isolated from the external world by fully climate-controlled,
protective buildings and vehicles. I also cannot ignore the fact
that most people on earth still live that way.

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26

in a classroom that seals her off from any direct interaction with
the natural processes that she is studying.
Worrying about how to teach children about a world from
which they are so isolated eventually led me back to the original
concept of geographia. Before students can understand the
world, they need to observe it. To observe it, they need to
experience it, of course, but they also need to notice it. It's not
just about looking; it's about seeing. And teachers have known
forever that the best way to get students to be good observers is
to engage them in documentation and description.
At National Geographic, we have begun exploring ways to
turn students into old-fashioned geographersin other words,
describers of their world. One of the strategies we have been
using is engaging students in what different people call citizen
Young people learning to notice patterns in nature.

science, public participation in research, and volunteered

geographic information initiatives. In these projects, participants

Middle-class American children no longer have much need to be

collect and share geographic information with each other and, in

aware of their environment. They are isolated and protected from

some cases, conduct investigations or solve problems with the

it, particularly during the part of the day set aside for education.

information. At National Geographic, we've adopted our own

The result is that we have created an excellent environment for

young people to learn math, language arts, and abstract science
and social studies, but we have created a terrible environment for
young people to learn about their world. I worry about my own
middle school daughter, who is studying earth science right now

term for these projects. We call them community geography

projects, and with support from the National Science Foundation
and Esri, we're developing a web-based GIS and social
networking platform to support community geography initiatives.
I like to use Project BudBurst as an example of how these
projects foster noticing. Project BudBurst is an educational

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27

outreach initiative of the National Ecological Observatory

(This article originally appeared in the Winter 2011/2012 issue of ArcNews.)

Network that focuses on phenology (seasonal changes) in plants.

The concept behind BudBurst is very simple. You pick a specific
tree or shrub and monitor it throughout the year, recording your
observations in a database that is shared among thousands of
people monitoring other trees and shrubs throughout the United
States. You note when flower and leaf buds appear and open.
You also note when they fade, turn color, and fall off.
It's safe to say that virtually every student in every classroom in
America knows that plants have seasonal cycles. But how many of
them know the specific cycle of any specific types of plants? And
how many know how these cycles change from place to place
and year to year? And how many know what the natural variability
of those cycles is in a specific location or a specific year?
It is only when people are familiar with these kinds of patterns
and cycles that they can begin to understand what it might mean
for human activities to change the environment.
So, ironically, the key to achieving the understanding and
problem solving that we associate with modern geography is to
start with the observation, documentation, and description that
are characteristics of traditional geography.
Information about National Geographic Education's Community
Geography initiative is available at natgeoed.org/community
-geography.

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The Challenge of Defining Geo-Literacy

For quite some time, I've been struggling with the challenge of

My challenge is that these bullets do not mean much to most

how to explain to the general public what geo-literacy is and why

Americans. Not only do most Americans lack these abilities, I

it is important. Over more than a year, with a lot of help from

believe that most of them have never even heard anyone talk

others, I've developed a definition that captures the essence

about them. Phrases like reasoning about systems, geographic

of geo-literacy and resonates with both academic and applied

reasoning, and systematic decision making do not convey much

geographers.

meaning to people who have never been taught those skills.

As I've written in this space before, geo-literacy is preparation

for making geographic and far-reaching decisions. Geographic

Worse, they do not have the power of name recognition the way
algebra and calculus do.

decisions are decisions about location or transportation; far-

The challenge here is how to convey a message about the

reaching decisions are decisions that have remote consequences.

importance of knowing something to people who don't know

Geo-literacy requires three abilities:

it themselves and to do it without (a) making them feel bad for

The ability to reason about human systems, environmental

systems, and human-environment interactions
The ability to reason about geography
The ability to reason through decisions systematically
If you are an ArcNews reader, then the odds are good that these
three bullets mean something pretty specific to you and that your
interpretation of these bullets is pretty close to mine.

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something that is not their fault or (b) putting them off with a
tone of superiority.
I am writing this column because I don't know how to solve this
challenge, and I am looking for help. I am pretty sure, however,
that the path to the solution lies through compelling examples.
I argue that the reason modern societies need to provide their
citizens with geo-education is the big cost that people pay
individually and collectively for geo-illiteracy. My hunch is that the
right examples of these costs will convince people.

The Challenge of Defining Geo-Literacy

29

Here are a few examples drawn from modern American life, some

such as Iraq and Afghanistan. A geo-literate individual should

of them from my own experiences:

be able to analyze information about locations to form an

A geo-literate individual should be able to take constraints and

considerations into account to optimize choices about locations.

independent assessment of the appropriateness of a proposed

action in those locations.

This is a case of geographic reasoning. For example, when

I would have more confidence in the democratic decision-

people are not able to identify and weigh their commuting

making process about military deployments in America if more

options successfully, they pay costs in the forms of wasted

Americans were able to interpret thematic maps showing

money, lost time, and frustration that only grow over time. When

topography, ethnic and religious populations, and distribution of

owners of small retail businesses or decision makers in large retail

natural resources. I believe there are many valid arguments on

businesses make poor decisions about location, they pay for their

both sides for whether the United States should have gone to war

failures in geographic reasoning in lost business, which translates

in Iraq and Afghanistan, some of which may outweigh geographic

directly into lower revenues for the company and reduced

considerations. However, I worry about the role of the public in

economic opportunity for the workforce.

making decisions like these in a society where many are not able

The cost of a store or restaurant closing because of a poorly

to reason systematically about geographic factors.

chosen location goes far beyond the business owner. It is an

Even though there is no way to determine, even in retrospect,

economic loss for the community. We currently consider the

whether we have made the right decision about military

frequent failure of retail establishments to just be a part of life.

deployments, we can still assess the costs associated with those

However, a substantial percentage of these failures is a direct

decisions. In the case of these large-scale military deployments,

result of poor geographic reasoning that could be prevented,

the costs are measured in billions of dollars, thousands of lost

leading to substantial economic benefits.

lives, and hundreds of thousands of lives permanently changed.

Another important kind of geographic reasoning is not about

A geo-literate individual should be able to anticipate remote

where to do something but about whether to do something in

impacts of local decisions. This is a case of reasoning about

a particular location. For example, in the last decade, citizens

systems. For example, in the Chesapeake Bay watershed where

of America and many other nations have faced decisions about

I live, state governments advise residents to only wash their cars

whether they should send troops to fight wars in foreign lands,

at car washes because the runoff affects water quality in the

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30

bay. If most people who receive this advice do not understand

the impact of detergent and other runoff from roads on aquatic
ecosystemswhich most don'tand do not understand where
the water that leaves the bottom of their driveway goeswhich
most also don'tthen the odds that they will follow that advice
are very low.
The same goes for farmers and fertilizer, though farmers in the
Chesapeake watershed are subject to laws restricting runoff,
not just advisories. If farmers do not understand the effects of
fertilizer runoff and they know that their state government cannot
afford to enforce runoff laws, they are unlikely to expend much
effort to obey them.
The result of uninformed decision making about runoff is an
enormous environmental and financial cost resulting from millions
of individual decisions with far-reaching consequences. The
fisheries in the Chesapeake Bay, the Gulf of Mexico, the San
Francisco Bay, Puget Sound, and many others, are all threatened
by runoff. The livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of individuals
who depend directly or indirectly on fishing in those locations are
threatened.
Those are three examples of how the widespread lack of geoliteracy can add up to huge societal costs. What do you think?
Are these compelling?
(This article originally appeared in the Summer 2011 issue of ArcNews.)

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Scaling Up Classroom Maps

Usually, when you talk about the scale of a map, you're talking
about the ratio of distances on the map to distances in the
real world. These days, however, when educators working with
National Geographic maps talk about scale, they may be talking
about how big the map is. For example, a teacher may have her
students working on a map at the "scale" of a tabletop, a large
wall, or even a basketball court.
So what's going on with all these big maps? Well, we've learned
that kids find large maps to be magnetic. And not just young kids.
Teens and adults find large maps irresistible as well.
Imagine walking into your school gym and finding half of the floor
covered in a glorious, full-color, National Geographic map of Asia.
If your school is one of those that has signed up for a visit from
one of National Geographic's Giant Traveling Maps, you could.
Most people find they can't just look at these maps. They must

Two Middlebury, Vermont, third graders explore the Atlantic coast of

South America (photo: Dan Beaupre).

walk on them. They count how many steps it takes to get from
Beijing to Moscow. They lie down to see if they can reach from

Frankly, people find the scale of these maps fascinating. And

the southern tip of India to the northern tip. They find the maps

educational. Unlike regular-sized maps, you can see lots of detail

amusing, just like the oversized cereal boxes at Costco.

and a large portion of the earth's surface at the same time.

Similarly, you don't shift your eyes or turn the page if you want to
look at a different location. You move your whole body, like you

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32

do in the real world. These maps allow people to interact with a

map kinesthetically, experiencing scale and direction as physical
sensation.
Now imagine taking 136 sheets of 8.5" x 11" paper and putting
them together to form a mosaic map of the world that is
17sheets wide and 8 sheets tall. If you download one of the free
NatGeo MapMaker Kits, you could. These "megamaps" are only
10 feet wide and 7 feet tall, but they still take several strides to
walk across. And, since they are made of regular printer paper,
you can draw or paste things on them. You can even cut them up.

Students at Alta Vista Elementary School in Los Altos,

California, take a well-earned break after traveling
from Florida to Alaska on the Giant Traveling Map of
North America (photo: Scott Schilling).

Students use markers to illustrate data on National Geographic

Education's NatGeo MapMaker Kits (photo: Mark Thiessen, NGS).

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beanbags. The MapMaker Kits are designed as basemaps for

students to draw, glue, or overlay information on.
In fact, some of the most engaging activities for these oversized
maps are essentially low-tech versions of geospatial analyses.
Have you ever represented a buffer with a hula hoop? Measured
a linear distance in units of arm spans? In a classroom down the
street, students may be symbolizing data by pasting construction
paper circles of differing sizes and colors on a map. Or they may
be creating contour maps with yarn and delineating watershed
boundaries with a crayon.
Some of the best educational ideas are just slight twists on
conventional practice. What we've discovered is that blowing up
Students record data about tourist impact on different countries in Europe
using National Geographic Education's NatGeo MapMaker Kits (photo:
Mark Thiessen, NGS).

These "scaled-up" maps have great educational potential. They

break down the usual barriers between people and maps. They

maps to unusual sizes is one of those ideas.

For more information about the Giant Traveling Maps, visit www
.nationalgeographic.com/giantmaps. For more information on the
NatGeo MapMaker Kits, visit www.natgeoed.org/mapping.
(This article originally appeared in the Spring 2011 issue of ArcNews.)

draw people in, and they encourage them to interact.

Both the Giant Traveling Maps and the MapMaker Kits are
packaged with a variety of hands-on (literally) activities. When
a Giant Traveling Map arrives at your school, it comes with a
trunk full of materials that transform it into a giant game board,
including giant dice, traffic cones, plastic building blocks, and

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TricordersThe Next Tool for Geographic Learning?

If you're of a certain age, you probably find yourself looking

One solution to this

around and remarking on how much today's world looks like the

problem is to create

world that Gene Roddenberry imagined in the original Star Trek

virtual worlds that

series. OK, we don't have transporters or warp drives. But we do

eliminate the messiness

have computers you can talk to, two-way video communications,

of the real world. For

and devices that work like communicators and tricorders.

example, you can create

There is a lot of discussion these days about what impact these

Star Trek technologies might have on education. In just the last
two weeks, I attended a one-day summit on the promise of
wireless technologies for education and a two-day workshop on
the use of mobile devices for citizen science.

a simulated world that

students interact with
on a computer screen
where all the water
quality probes are
properly calibrated and

For geoliteracy, I think these devices offer amazing opportunities

the relationship between

to move learning outside the school building, and we've been

water quality and

designing software at National Geographic that students will be

ecosystem health follows

able to take into the world on handhelds that will enable them

predictable patterns.

to record observations, combine them with observations of

Unfortunately, these

others, and analyze them for geospatial patterns. However, an

simulations sacrifice the

inescapable challenge of learning in the real world is that the real

experience of moving

world is complex and unpredictable. Sometimes it is too complex

around and using actual devices for the benefits of predictability.

and unpredictable to enable you to be sure that you can teach

specific relationships or skills through real-world experiences.

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Tricorder or augmented reality?

However, in recent years, I've been hearing about some

very clever people who have been designing what they call

TricordersThe Next Tool for Geographic Learning?

35

"augmented reality" environments to get the best of both worlds.

where you can "sample" the water and make other

Here's an example:

observations.

Researchers from the Missouri Botanical Garden and

The handheld screen displays your position on an

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) are working with

aerial photograph as you move toward your next

upper elementary and middle school teachers to design games

stop, indicated by an icon on the screen. At each

in which students move around in the real world but interact

location, a simulated expert poses provocative

with simulated characters on the screen of a handheld and use

questions and encourages student investigators

the handheld to make observations and measurements that are

to observe salient features. With limited time to

generated by a simulation. Some of the scenarios that they have

complete your investigation, you have to draw on

explored in their games include watershed studies, food web

what you already know and what you learn from the

investigations, and a cemetery-based scavenger hunt where

simulation to make wise choices.

students "meet" people who had lived in their community

through minibiographies crafted from historic census records.

The advantage of this kind of augmented reality experience over

"ordinary" reality is that students' experiences can be designed

I asked Bob Coulter, the director of the project at the Missouri

to provide the optimum amount of complexity and challenge for

Botanical Garden, what playing one of these games feels like, and

their stage in the learning process. Middle school students can

he described it like this:

operate in a world where everything follows predictable patterns.

Imagine you have already learned a bit about

watersheds, point and non-point source pollution,
and some basic measures of water quality. As
part of your study, you now have the opportunity

College students can operate in a world with sensor error and

statistical anomalies. They can also carry learning resources, like
field guides, with them in the field, and they can communicate
with each other in real time.

to investigate a water pollution problem in the

The advantage over virtual reality is that students are able to

park down the street. To start, you watch a short

move around on real terrain and develop real-world skills, like

video of a local water quality expert on your GPS-

coordinating between an overhead map and their on-the-

enabled handheld. After the expert introduces your

ground view. For designers, augmented reality enables them

challenge, the handheld guides you to relevant sites

to take advantage of all the attributes of the local setting

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36

without being limited by them at all. The project at the Missouri

Botanical Gardens is taking advantage of the MIT Augmented
Reality (MITAR) authoring tools, created by Eric Klopfer and his
colleagues, which allow teachers to create their own learning
games for their own students and their own locale.
Right now, this is all still in the experimental stage. The
researchers are working out how to blend real and simulated
worlds and help teachers design effective learning activities.
Once they have figured all these things out, though, these
Star Trek technologies are going to take real-world geographic
learning to a whole new level.
(This article originally appeared in the Winter 2010/2011 issue of ArcNews.)

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Back to School with Geo-Literacy

It is back-to-school season as I write this, and I'm thinking about

geographic knowledge and skills that young people will need

goals for the next year. In education, as in many other domains,

to make the decisions they will face throughout their lives that

goals are everything. If you don't have clear goals that you can

have consequences for the well-being of the planet and its

communicate effectively, then you're never going to make any

inhabitants. We call these far-reaching decisions becauseeven

progress.

though the decision makers may not realize itthe consequences

When I started working at the National Geographic Society, I

was immediately confronted with the challenge of clarifying and
articulating the goals of our K-12 educational efforts. This process
has taken some time. I've been here more than two years, and
we're still working on it, but it's probably the most important
work we'll do.
National Geographic has been committed to improving K12
geography education in the United States and Canada for
decades. However, improving geography education is, at the
same time, too broad and too narrow. Geography is boundless,
so our first goal-setting challenge was to find a focus that is
narrower than geography as a whole.
Using the broader National Geographic mission to inspire people
to care about the planet as a guide, we are focusing our efforts
on those aspects of geography that will prepare students to
care for the planet. Specifically, we have chosen to focus on the

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of the decisions extend far beyond the individual and his or her
location. Far-reaching decisions may be personal, professional, or
civic. They may be routine or come once in a lifetime. They range
from decisions about how to commute to work to whether to
outsource your company's manufacturing overseas to how to vote
on a public referendum on immigration.
As we have investigated what people need to know to make farreaching decisions, we have found that the knowledge and skills
that they need go beyond geography. So we've found ourselves
adjusting our scope to be more focused within geography and to
extend beyond geography. In our current conception, our goals
include three primary components: systems thinking, geographic
reasoning, and evidence-based decision making.
Systems thinking: Scientists today view the world as a set of
interconnected natural and human systems. These systems
create, transform, and move resources. Natural systems

Back to School with Geo-Literacy

38

include atmospheric, hydrologic, and ecological systems.

Because these goals no longer fit neatly within the traditional

Human systems include economic, political, and cultural

conception of geography, we have coined a new term for them,

systems. To be geo-literate, a person must be able to reason

which I've used in this column before. We call this combination

about how he or she depends on these different systems and

of systems thinking, geographic reasoning, and evidence-based

how his or her actions can affect them.

decision making geo-literacy.

Geographic reasoning: Most of geography is based on two

Clearly, having a geo-literate populace is valuable for more

key principles: (1) the characteristics of a particular location

than just caring for the planet. It is valuable for economic

influence what can and does happen in that location and

competitiveness, national security, and personal well-being,

(2) every place on earth is connected to every other. To be

to name a few, and we have allies in our educational reform

geo-literate, a person must be able to reason about the

initiatives who are motivated by these concerns more than

characteristics of and about the connections between places

concern for the well-being of the planet. However, geo-literacy

to understand the implications of decisions.

is a priority for National Geographic's education programs

Evidence-based decision making: Well-reasoned decisions

involve a multistep reasoning process that includes both

because of our particular concern for environmental and cultural

conservation.

objective analysis of consequences and subjective weighing

So as I enter this back-to-school season, I am pleased to have

of trade-offs based on values. A person must be able to

a set of clear, coherent, and focused goals to guide our efforts.

systematically analyze consequences of decisions and

On the other hand, I am acutely aware that the components of

evaluate their pros and cons based on his or her values.

geo-literacy cross traditional curricular boundaries and call for

When combined, these three components provide an individual

with the knowledge and skills to recognize decisions as being
far reaching and make them systematically. Of course, this does
not mean that everyone will make the same decisions. There will
always be differences of opinion about the likelihood of various

knowledge and skills that have not been part of any curriculum
before. That gives the idea of back-to-school a new meaning. As
I enter the school year with more clearly defined and articulated
goals, I am also aware that over the next few years, we will have
to go back to school in the design of the K12 curriculum.

consequences and how to value different outcomes.

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More Information
To find out how you can support National Geographic's geoliteracy initiatives, visit www.nationalgeographic.com/foundation
/geographic_literacy.html.
(This article originally appeared in the Fall 2010 issue of ArcNews.)

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GeoMentors Make a Difference

At the 2009 Esri International User Conference, Jack
Dangermond, president of Esri, announced the GeoMentor
Program during the plenary. This exciting collaboration between
Esri and the National Geographic Society is designed to get
more GIS professionals involved in education. The program helps
GIS professionals find schools and other settings where they can
serve as GeoMentors to the students.
There are lots of ways that GeoMentors can help educators, and
the GeoMentor Web site provides a matchmaking service to help
educators find GeoMentors that are well-suited to their needs
and setting. The Web site allows GeoMentors and educators
to seek out an appropriate partner and provides a safe channel
through which to initiate contact. The site offers many ideas for
projects that teachers and GeoMentors can work on together
and tips for how to collaborate successfully.
In the past year, many lives have been changed by GeoMentors,
so I asked Charlie Fitzpatrick, Esri K12 education manager and

focuses on the challenges and failures, these stories show us what

leader of the GeoMentor initiative for Esri, to share some stories

is possible and offer us hope.

from these volunteers and the educators they've worked with. At

a time when so much of the media coverage about education

Charlie reports that some educators have needed on-site

assistance with getting software installed, convincing the
guardians of computer labs that GIS activities are a legitimate

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use of computers, or simply showing how to work through basic

through their questions. Sometimes it's 'Where do I find data

activities.

about my subject?' Other times, they ask something where all I

One elementary school teacher told Charlie, "It's just priceless

having [the mentor] here. She was really persistent in helping us
overcome the technical hurdles from our system, just installing
through the permissions we have. Then, once it was installed,
the kids are so fast with computers, they go beyond me quickly

say is, 'Look in the help file about the word X,' and they're off and
running, just because they couldn't figure out the specific word to
search under, like 'mosaic.' Sometimes, they can't wait and will ask
me that by e-mail, and I just need to send back a single sentence
to get them on track."

and I can't always help them. She came in and wrote down some

These stories have us convinced that we're on the right track with

procedures to help us do our work. The kids know how to do

the GeoMentor Program. We were delighted with the outpouring

things, but when they get stuck, they go back to the sheets and

of interest we received at last year's Esri User Conference, and

figure out how to move forward. I couldn't have done this project

we've continued to build up the numbers of registered mentors

without her."

and educators throughout the year. We are still learning

While some educators keep a mentor all to themselves, others

encourage them to work directly with students. One longtime
mentor who worked with an individual student wrote, "I don't do
stuff like that for the publicity but for the individuals involved. I'm

lessons about how to help educators and mentors find the right
match and what resources we can offer to help them get their
collaborations under way. We expect to continue to expand and
improve the GeoMentor Web site for some time to come.

happy to report that the student I e-mentored made it to college,

In the face of all the challenges of creating a new program,

where he's pursuing his dream of becoming an architect! That's

though, we continue to be driven by the clear need for programs

satisfaction enough for me."

like this one. As one club leader recently told Charlie, "Yes, there

The most surprising thing Charlie told me is how much impact a

mentor can have with a relatively small commitment of time. One
mentor told Charlie, "I go visit the school once a month, and
now when I arrive, the teacher has a couple questions and the

are lots of clubs, and they are doing some cool things, but if we
had more adult volunteers, we could easily engage three times
as many kids. That's the same everywhere. What we need most is
helpers."

kids have some specific questionsthey write these down on a

The goal of the GeoMentor Program is to recruit more of these

page ahead of timeand we spend the whole time just running

helpers and connect them to educators who can use their help. If

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this appeals to you, then please visit the GeoMentor Web site for
ideas and inspiration and to seek out an educator who would like
your assistance. It's easy to make a difference, and the rewards
are unparalleled.

More Information
The GeoMentor Program is a joint initiative of Esri and the
National Geographic Society, being implemented under the
direction of Charlie Fitzpatrick from Esri and Anne Haywood from
National Geographic. For more information or to sign up, visit
www.geomentor.org.
(This article originally appeared in the Summer 2010 issue of ArcNews.)

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A Revolution in Geographic Education:

Virginia's Geospatial Semester
A high school class in which students learn to use ArcGIS
Desktop tools, work on real projects in their community, and get
college credits . . . sound too good to be true? Well, it's not.
Professor Bob Kolvoord of James Madison University in
Harrisonburg, Virginia, has created the Geospatial Semester, a
course that is currently being taken by more than 300 students in
12 different school districts across the state of Virginia. Students
who enroll in the course have the option of receiving course
credit from James Madison, a four-year public university, if their
work meets Kolvoord's standards. Because he and a colleague
work directly with the participating teachers and students, their
work almost always does.
The most exciting thing about the Geospatial Semester to me is
the way it engages students in inquiry-based learning throughout.
In my experience, too many introductory GIS courses are taught
in the style that I call "peas and carrots," as in, "If you eat your
peas and carrots now, you'll get to have dessert later." In the peas
and carrots approach to learning GIS, students struggle through
days and weeks of learning the mechanics of GIS in the hopes of
one day actually getting to work on an interesting problem. How
many classes in GIS consist of going through menu options one

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Map showing the percentage of impervious surfaces in the Rivanna

Watershed. (Courtesy of Paul Rittenhouse and his Geospatial
Semester students at Western Albemarle High School in Crozet,
Virginia.)

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after another or learning how to do operations without knowing

The projects require students to work cooperatively in teams

why you would use them?

and connect them to their local community as they pursue a

In Kolvoord's approach, students spend the bare minimum

amount of time learning the mechanics of GIS and begin
working on interesting, real-world problems from the start. They
add to their repertoire of GIS skills by working on increasingly
challenging projects, some of which are taken from the book
Making Spatial Decisions Using GIS (Esri Press, 2008), written

solution to their particular problem. The solutions to these

community challenges are not simple and require the students
to assess the impact of their solution on different constituencies
or stakeholders. As Kolvoord describes it, "[The students] get
a good look at a rich tapestry of complications that challenge
workers every day as they struggle with these types of problems."

by Kolvoord and collaborator Kathryn Keranen, a pioneering

Since its beginning in 2005 in four schools, more than 1,000

high school GIS educator. Making Spatial Decisions is the fourth

students have already passed through the Geospatial Semester.

volume in Esri's award-winning Our World GIS Education book

Kolvoord is quick to credit the teachers for the success of the

series designed for classroom use.

program. Not only do the teachers need to develop GIS skills

While learning GIS skills is important, the primary focus of the

class is the real-world project that every student does. Each

themselves, they also need to be expert at guiding students in

doing independent projects.

student completes a community-based research project involving

Kolvoord is now starting to think about how to scale the program

spatial reasoning and decision making. Student projects have

up. He envisions it being a nationwide program one day but

included work with The Nature Conservancy, various city and

recognizes that the biggest challenges are limited GIS expertise

local governmental agencies, and private businesses.

in schools and the difficulty of finding organizations that will work

Their projects have included exploring the water quality in the

creeks, streams, and rivers that make up a local watershed;

with students on projects. However, he sees great promise in the

GeoMentor program as a way to overcome these challenges.

identifying appropriate sites for cellular towers or wind turbines;

I can see it now . . . a high school class in thousands of

and creating community evacuation plans. In the process,

communities across the United States, in which students learn

students develop their critical thinking, spatial reasoning,

to use ArcGIS Desktop tools, work on real projects in their

communication, and teamwork skills, while addressing a problem

community, get college credit, and work with a GIS professional

that's important to them and their community.

as a mentor.

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More Information
Visit the GeoMentor program at geomentor.org and National
Geographic Fund for Geo-Literacy at www.nationalgeographic
.com/foundation/geographic_literacy.html.
(This article originally appeared in the Spring 2010 issue of ArcNews.)

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The Importance of Innovation in Teaching

Giving people an image of what learning could be like is a really
important part of improving education. Students, teachers,
administrators, parents, policy makers, and community members
have remarkably similar views of what education looks like, and
those views have not changed much since we were in school.
Despite the fact that the dominant image is in conflict with much
of what we know about how children and adolescents learn
best, it is deeply ingrained in our culture. It is so ingrained that
approaches to education that differ from this model are typically
met with resistance by participants and stakeholders.
If you want to make students and teachers uncomfortable, ask
them to work in a configuration that goes against convention. Ask
most American high school students to sit in a circle or to share
their work with others in small groups, and they will squirm with
discomfort. Ask most American principals to evaluate the quality
of teaching and learning in a classroom in which students are
moving around the classroom, talking and arguing, and making
messes, and they will conclude that the teacher is unable to
control the students and that learning is being undermined by
the disorder. And yet, these are precisely the kinds of conditions
that have been shown to maximize learning.

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Students using crayons and a map of the world can draw their best
guesses of what the distribution of temperatures is like all around the
world in the month of July. This activity can be engaging to students,
giving them a chance to draw on what they know in a way that makes them
curious about what they don't know. This lesson is based on research that
says that if students are asked to articulate their current understanding of
a phenomenon before they are taught something new about it, then they
learn the new material more effectively because they can connect it to
their existing understanding.

Along with traditional views about the conditions that lead to

learning, most of us carry around traditional views about what
constitutes learning. Most of us were educated in a system
that focused very heavily on learning facts, and we still tend to
associate the state of being well-educated with knowing a lot of

The Importance of Innovation in Teaching

47

facts. Even as we say that 21st-century citizens and workers need

and it's dangerous to have students do things like that if you

to be able to think critically, solve complex problems, and work in

won't be able to correct them.

teams, we assess the progress of students in terms of what they

know.

At the beginning of her lesson, Ms. Scarlet grew concerned that

Ms. Brown had been right. Even though they were excited about

If we are serious about educating a generation of geo-literate

getting crayons, her students were slow to start drawing, and

citizens, it is important that we break down our own out-of-date

Ms. Scarlet saw them looking nervously at each other's papers.

views about learning and replace them with new images of how

After a few minutes, though, they became very engaged in the

we should educate young people and what kind of knowledge

temperature-drawing activity. In fact, she only wanted them to

and skills we should be aiming for. Here's an example.

spend 5 minutes drawing their temperature maps so she could

Consider the following two descriptions of how teachers might

teach the first day of a unit on climate for eighth graders. (These
are fictionalized composites based on real teachers and students.)
In one classroom, Ms. Brown projects several maps displaying

begin discussing them, but her students insisted on taking 10.

When she asked them what they drew and why, two-thirds of
the students' hands shot up. Over the course of the discussion,
several students shouted questions out of turn about what the
"real" temperatures were and why temperatures are different from

global distribution of temperatures at different times of year and

place to place. At the end of the discussion, in which students

asks her students to identify and discuss interesting patterns.

voiced many thoughtssome right and some wrongabout the

In her classroom, Ms. Scarlet gives each of her students six

crayons and a map of the world displaying continent outlines. She

factors that influence temperature, they practically begged her to

show them a map of global temperature distributions.

asks them to draw their best guess of what the distribution of

In Ms. Brown's class, on the other hand, the lesson was very

temperatures is like all around the world in the month of July.

different. After Ms. Brown put her global temperature maps on

The day before, when Ms. Scarlet told Ms. Brown about this
activity, Ms. Brown warned her she was making a big mistake. Ms.
Brown told Ms. Scarlet that her eighth graders will get frustrated
because they won't know enough to color the map in. Worse, she
argued, the students are likely to draw things that are incorrect,

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the projector, she had to ask three different prompting questions

about what they saw in the map and wait a full 30 secondsan
eternity in front of a classroomuntil one student reluctantly
raised her hand and said, "It looks like it's warmer closer to
the equator." After a few more minutes of discussion, in which
a handful of students each identified a pattern, Ms. Brown

The Importance of Innovation in Teaching

48

instructed them to take out their books and start reading about

the likelihood that they will replace the old in their memories with

the causes of temperature variation.

the new.

Ms. Scarlet's approach made Ms. Brown uncomfortable. She

didn't like the unfamiliar practice of asking students to do a task

More Information

before they'd been taught to do it. It even made the students

Visit the GeoMentor program at geomentor.org and National

uncomfortable at first. They aren't used to speculating, and Ms.

Geographic Fund for Geo-Literacy at www.nationalgeographic

Scarlet had to reassure them that they wouldn't be graded on

.com/foundation/geographic_literacy.html.

their maps or even asked to hand them in.

(This article originally appeared in the Winter 2009/2010 issue of ArcNews.)

However, in the end, Ms. Scarlet's activity was much more

engaging to students, and it achieved its goal more effectively
than Ms. Brown's. Both activities were intended to get students
to notice patterns in global temperature and develop interest
in the sources of those patterns. Ms. Brown's assumed that
students would be naturally motivated to notice differences
and be curious about them. Ms. Scarlet's recognized that they
wouldn't be, and it engaged them in an activity in which they
had to draw on what they knew in a way that made them curious
about what they didn't know. Ms. Scarlet's lesson is also based
on research that says that if you ask students to articulate their
current understanding of a phenomenon before you teach
them something new about it, they learn the new material
more effectively because they can connect it to their existing
understanding. Ms. Brown was afraid the map-drawing activity
might reinforce a student's misconception, but in fact, the reverse
is true. By eliciting students' misconceptions, a teacher increases

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Get Involved with Geo-Education Reform

We've got a problem in our country. The rate of geographic

where to live or evaluating a ballot initiative that would affect land

literacymeaning the number of people who can synthesize

use. In a well-functioning school system, most students would

geographic information from a variety of sources and draw a

achieve geographic competence by the end of middle school.

sound conclusionis abysmally low. On the other hand, ArcNews

goes to almost a million individuals who earn their living by doing
that kind of geographic reasoning every day.
So, what we have is an enormous geographic literacy gap. We
have a solid core of geographic experts, including the readers of
ArcNews, but once we get outside that group, there is a dramatic
drop-off in the level of geographic understanding and skills. As
the companies and agencies that are struggling to fill openings
for GIS professionals can attest, we can certainly use more
geographic experts in our country. However, from a societal
perspective, I believe the gap in expertise between experts and
the rest of the population is a much bigger problem.
For our society to function effectively in the modern world,
we need the vast majority of our population to be either
geographically competent or geographically proficient. These
are terms I use to describe nonexpert levels of geographic
literacy. Geographically competent describes individuals who are
prepared for everyday geographic reasoning, such as choosing

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A rough estimate of the distribution of geographic literacy among

18-year-olds in the U.S. today (left) and the distribution that National
Geographic is committed to achieving by 2025 (right).

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50

Geographically proficient describes college readiness in

If we are serious about reducing this geoliteracy gap, then the

geographic skills and understanding. A geographically fluent

question we have to ask ourselves is, Where is the solution to

individual is prepared for college-level coursework in subjects

this geoliteracy gap going to come from? It is not going to be

that require geographic skills and understanding, such as

solved by the majority. The majority are not even in a position

international relations or environmental science. At the National

to understand what they are missing. The solution is going to

Geographic Society, we have set the goal of achieving a

come from the people who can see the price that our society is

50 percent rate of geographic fluency among 18-year-olds by

paying on a daily basis for the lack of geographic literacy among

2025.

its citizens. It is going to come from the relatively small minority

While there are no statistics on the distribution among different

levels of geographic literacy in the United States, there is

of geographically literate individuals, especially the geographic

experts.

pretty good evidence that a majority of Americans are not

So, what actions can individual GIS professionals and other

geographically competent. Our goal is to flip this distribution

applied geographers take to help move along the incipient

over the next couple of decades. Furthermore, our goal is to have

campaign to boost geographic literacy?

the geographically proficient population be the largest, followed

by the geographically competent and geographically expert
populations.

The first action is personal. It is important that we start building

public awareness of why geographic literacy is so important and
what a good geographic education would teach our children.

One reason that increasing the rate of geographic literacy is more

Those of us who "do geography" on a daily basis need to start

important than increasing the number of geographic experts is

talking to the people in our families and communities about what

that the public is the audience for the work of geographic experts

we do, so they start to understand that geographic literacy is not

at the end of the day. We can no longer afford for corporate

about knowing where things are but about knowing how to plan

executives, policy makers, politicians, and even the general public

and make decisions.

to be uneducated about geographic planning and decision

making. If they are, then the work of geographic experts is largely
wasted. Of course, the other reason is that if we increase the
supply of individuals at the other levels of geographic literacy,
then the pool for geographic experts gets larger.

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By talking to our family and friends about the kind of geographic

problem solving we do, we can start to help them see what their
children are missing in their educations. It is possible to talk to
people about the kinds of work that GIS professionals do without

Get Involved with Geo-Education Reform

51

using terms like symbology, constraint satisfaction, buffer, and

The third action is educational. There are valuable roles for

model. It can be good practice for us and eye opening for them.

geography professionals to play in their local educational

The second action is political. At both the state and federal levels,
it is important that people who understand the importance of
geographic literacy advocate for improved geographic education
in our schools. As a result of hard work by a large number
of "geoevangelists," all 50 states, the District of Columbia,
and Puerto Rico have social studies, science, and technology
standards that call for geographic literacy. However, these state
standards are revised every few years, and if we don't stay
vigilant, they can be changed. If you are interested in finding out

system. Many GIS professionals teach at community colleges

and in professional seminars. This is very important for filling
the pipeline for geographic experts, but there are things we can
do in the K12 system that will start to boost the numbers of
geographically competent and proficient individuals. However,
finding and developing opportunities to work in schools can
be tricky. So, National Geographic and Esri are teaming up on
a GeoMentoring program to pair geography professionals with
K12 teachers to bring their expertise into the classroom.

about the current policy situation in your state, you can contact

At the Esri International User Conference this summer, we will

your state geographic alliance (find yours at www.ngsednet.org

be introducing this new program that will provide geography

/communities).

professionals with guidelines for working with schools and

At the federal level, there is legislation pending in Congress

right now to establish a fund for the improvement of geography
teaching. Geography is the only subject listed in No Child Left
Behind as a core academic subject that has no federal funding
program. The bill in Congress, called the Teaching Geography

materials for activities they can do with teachers in their local

schools. These activities will range from "pre-GIS" activities using
paper maps, crayons, and cutouts for lower grades and schools
with limited technology access to real GIS activities using Esri
software in schools.

is Fundamental Act, has strong bipartisan support, but it will not

The fourth action is financial. In most of the scientific disciplines,

pass unless legislators know that there are constituents who care.

a substantial stream of funding for educational improvement

All it takes is a few minutes to make a phone call or write a letter,

comes from scientists and the companies that employ them. Over

and it can make a huge difference. National Geographic has

time, the cause of geographic literacy is going to require that

information about the bill and how to contact your legislators at

same level of support. In a future column, I will describe some

www.nationalgeographic.com/foundation/policy_initiative.html.

giving opportunities for individuals and organizations to support

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the improvement of geographic education at local, state, and

national levels.
In closing, I have two points to make. One is that the problem
is urgent. The second is that the solution we are seeking will, at
best, come slowly and only through serious and prolonged effort.
There are things that we, as geographic experts, can and should
do today, and I encourage you to begin right away. I must also
caution you, though, that improving education is more about
tortoises than it is about hares. So, if you do talk to a neighbor,
call your senator, or become a GeoMentor, don't do it as a quick
fix. Be prepared to stick with it for a while. If we all do, we will be
able to make a change.
(This article originally appeared in the Summer 2009 issue of ArcNews.)

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Geographic Literacy in U.S. by 2025

For more than a decade, the National Geographic Society and

rainforest is located. And, after being at war with Iraq for three

Esri have worked together to advance the cause of geographic

years, 63 percent of young Americans could not identify Iraq on a

literacy in the United States.

map of the Middle East.

This new ArcNews column represents the next step in that

If you're like me, you find it hard to believe those statistics

collaboration. We are reaching out to the Esri user community,

because they are so discouraging, but they are true. However,

the largest organization of GIS professionals in the world, to

by paying too much attention to these statistics, we could easily

engage you in this important campaign.

teach American schoolchildren a lot of disconnected geographic

In this inaugural column, I will address the questions of what

geographic literacy is and why GIS professionals have such an

facts about the world that distract us from what people really
need.

important role to play in our campaign to increase the rate of

Knowing geography facts does little good if you can't do

geographic literacy in the United States. In future "Geo Learning"

something with those facts. People don't need to know

columns, I will describe specific ways that you can get involved in

geography, they need to be able to do geography. To me, doing

this effort.

geography is what geographic literacy is all about.

It's no secret that Americans know next to nothing about

The problem facing American society right now is that most

geography. The most recent National Geographic/Roper Poll

people don't even know what it means to do geography. So who

(2006) found that half the 1824-year-old Americans surveyed

does know what it means to do geography and understand why it

could not locate New York on a map of the United States, and

is so important? You do.

nearly 6 in 10 could not locate Ohio.

GIS professionals know what it means to analyze and solve

One-third of the young adults in the survey gave the wrong

geospatial problems. GIS professionals routinely apply

answer when asked to name the continent where the Amazon

geographic analysis to complex situations, predict consequences,

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construct plans, and make decisions. Not only do GIS

to prepare for natural disasters, whether to go to war abroad,

professionals know what it means to do geography, they also

where to locate a store or factory, or how to market goods

understand how valuable the ability to do geography is to them

abroad? The list goes on and on.

individually, to their employers, and to our society.

An even bigger problem than the low rate of geographic literacy

To me, GIS professionals represent the standard against which

in this country is that Americans don't even know enough to see

we should measure geographic literacy. I do not mean that

the price that they are paying individually and as a society. Most

every individual should have the level of expertise that GIS

Americans don't have any idea how much better their lives and

professionals have. That's neither appropriate nor realistic.

our world could be if they could all do geography. Once again,

However, we should aspire to having all Americans be able

to conduct basic geographic analysis in order to make sound
personal, political, and professional decisions. This is not about
technology, either; I'm not arguing that all Americans need to be
able to use a GIS.
My point is about analysis. I believe that every American should

the largest group that does understand the value of geographic

literacy is the community of GIS professionals, and that is why the
National Geographic Society and Esri want to enlist you in our
long-term campaign to create a geographically literate society.
So, what have we done historically, where are we now, and where
do we hope to go with your help?

understand how the attributes of a location and its relationship

Beginning more than 20 years ago, the National Geographic

to other locations affect that location. Every adult should

Society took up the cause of geographic literacy and created

understand that his or her actions have predictable effects

an education foundation to fund geography education

elsewhere and that what happens elsewhere affects them. Today,

initiatives. Since then, we established a national network of state

most Americans go from kindergarten through college without

"geography alliances," which are university-based organizations

ever being taught how to trace causes forward or backward

that advocate for geography education and provide professional

across space or to analyze spatial relationships in order to predict

development for teachers. Funded by a combination of proceeds

or explain.

from National Geographic programs, state governments, and

Without this analytic ability, how would we ever expect them

to make good decisions about where to live and work, how to
transport themselves, what to buy and how to dispose of it, how

GeoLearning
J10261

private philanthropies, these alliances were successful in

establishing K12 standards for geographic literacy in all 50 U.S.
states; Washington, D.C.; and Puerto Rico.

Geographic Literacy in U.S. by 2025

55

The state geography alliances also created geography education

The year 2025 seems far away, but because educational reform

materials and trained thousands of K12 teachers in their states.

is a slow process, and we don't currently have the necessary

While teacher professional development is the key to improving

resources, this reform is an ambitious goal. To achieve our goal,

geographic literacy, it is also the biggest challenge. Most

we are working with the Alliance Network and other like-minded

teachers who are responsible for teaching geographic content,

organizations, such as the Association of American Geographers,

whether it's in the context of science or social studies, have never

National Council for Geographic Education, and Esri, on three

received any training in geography themselves.

parallel tasks:

In 20 years, the National Geographic-funded Alliance Network

has had an impressive impact in raw numbers, but percentagewise, it is just a drop in the bucket. That means, today, we face a
situation in which we have a powerful infrastructure for reforming
education, but we do not have the resources to bring about that
reform.
For that reason, we are in the process of launching the second

Create a combination of top-down policy and bottom-up

consumer demand for geographic literacy.
Obtain sufficient resources in the form of federal, state, and
philanthropic funding to mount a large-scale reform effort.
Create and implement plans for large-scale educational
reform at the state and local levels.

phase of our campaign for geographic literacy. The goal of

There are important roles for GIS professionals and other

this campaign is to approach universal geographic literacy.

applied geographers to play in all three of these strands, and in

Specifically, we set a goal to achieve 80 percent rates of

upcoming columns I will challenge you, the Esri user community,

geographic literacy in all 50 states by 2025, where geographic

to play your part.

literacy is defined as the ability of students to apply geographic

skills and understanding in their personal and civic lives. We

(This article originally appeared in the Spring 2009 issue of ArcNews.)

set a second goal to achieve 50 percent geographic fluency in

all 50 states at the same time. Geographic fluency is a higher
standard, which we define as preparation sufficient for successful
postsecondary study in subjects that require geographic skills
and understanding (e.g., international affairs or environmental
science).

GeoLearning
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Geographic Literacy in U.S. by 2025

56

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