Geography 2.0

Gapminder and animated statistics

2010-03-27T14:21:00.000-07:00

The Gapminder animated graph is fantatstic teaching and learning tool for upper school Human Geography students. It's interactive and students can use it to show changes in a huge number of variables across varied timescales. Countries are represented as bubbles, colour coded by continent and diametrically proportioaten to total population.

The website includes tutorials, teaching resources and a series of videos in which the incredibly entertaining Hans Rosling narrates the animated statistics. Wonderful stuff.

Hans Rosling demonstrates the tool in this video from TED:

And he's only half joking

2010-03-27T14:09:00.000-07:00

Some year 13 tutees enjoyed this and we had a laugh. A chat in tutorial revealed that they felt somewhat patronised by teachers "rattling on" about how privelaged they should feel to have gone through their formative years with unprecedented access to the information and how quickly the world is changing and if they don't show curiosity for digital developments they will be left behind etc etc etc.

GIS as revision tool

2010-03-27T13:53:00.000-07:00

I created this map as a revision aid for year 12 AS srudents - Geopolitics of Energy. The idea came out of a discussion with students about the importance of organisational skills. A common issue was the studets' ability to remember case study information, including location, relevance and scale. An interesting discussion followed about the emphasis we put on specific case studies as students were left feeling that case studies showed them unique processes and places rather than the real intention of contextualising Global processes. The map attempts to package a complicated case study of Geopolitics in Energy.

View The Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan Oil Pipeline in a larger map

Urban Earth Rural Earth

2010-02-01T10:43:00.000-08:00

Inspired by the very cool Urban Earth walkthroughs of various world cities, I set out to portray rural France in the same way. The route is provided as a Google Map below. Not exactly Mumbai, but it was fun to do and could be done as a project with students to engage them and bring the concept of "place" to their lived experience.

Rural Earth Walkthru - Fauconnieres "chez my mother-in-law" from Bobby Walker on Vimeo.

View Rural Earth Walkthru in Fauconnieres in a larger map

Where are you?

2009-02-01T14:28:00.001-08:00

Geography 2.0 welcomes all visitors. Please click on the link below to add your location to the visitor map:

Satire in geography

2009-01-08T04:08:00.000-08:00

We're just tying up a unit of work with year 7 on globalisation in the context of the fashion industry. A large focus has been on sweatshop conditions and how the low wages and long working hours allow companies to keep prices down in MEDCs. I'm wondering if this video would be appropriate for year 7 students:

As always with "The Onion", there is a satirical, almost cynical slant on their reports - is this accessible in year 7? Are 11 year-olds ready for this kind of twist on the values we try to instill?

Urban Earth City Walkthrus

2008-12-27T01:03:00.000-08:00

Those Geo-warriors at Urban Earth have been doing something very interesting. Take a walk through a city, stop every 8 paces and take a digital photograph. Put them together to take a virtual walk across Mumbai, Mexico City, London, Bristol or Guadalajara.

Here is Mumbai in around 10 minutes:

Embed the video!

2008-12-27T00:07:00.000-08:00

A video embedded on a page is much more effective and more likely to be watched. This clever video could be used to present a number of key concepts or specific topics - globalisation, crime, conflict, development, interdependence.

An issue in school is access to you tube. This is a personal bone of contention - you tube is filtered at my workplace. Is this to prevent students from wasting time or teachers, or both? Surely a simple system could be set up to allow this resource when teachers log in. This would be differentiation at it's purest. Why am I denied access to this resource which has potential to enhance teaching and learning of any subject. Creative use of you tube is something to celebrate and embrace - to filter it across the school network is like using a chainsaw to do a job which requires a scalpel!!!!

AQA AS Geography Revision Tool

2008-11-26T04:43:00.000-08:00

View Larger Map

Enthused by one student's collaboration on a football based google map, surely the application can be used to create a revision aid for A-Level students. We can assume that most students have access to internet either at home, at school or even in the community. A map which offers a geo-referenced revision material adds a spatial element to human geography topics which often appear removed from the physical aspects of the subject. Also, the material can be presented in a number of media. The map above was created as a tool for revision of Global Population Change as specified in the AQA AS course.

The next challenge lies in getting collaborators to add content. A group of 15 A-Level students has produced a grand total of zero additions to content. Have I misjudged the usefulness of this type of digitalmap as a revision tool? Maybe some classroom time is needed in which students are explicitly required to use the map as a revision tool. They could even be set the task of adding a relevant case study to the map and sharing this with other colaborators. Certainly, there needs to be some scaffolded learning if this type of resource is to be embraced by students autonomously.

Man Utd Map

2008-11-22T01:34:00.000-08:00

View Larger Map

Trying to engage KS5 students in google maps is proving tricky. I think developing skills in using and creating digital maps is at least, if not more important than the OS map skills we teach at KS3. My impassioned arguments that they will have to learn these skills sooner or later have been met with the deafening roar of indifference until one football mad student saw a map I had made showing the birth places of the relative starting 11s of the Man Utd sides that won the Champions League in 1968 and 1999. I made this map really just to get a grip on the google map application. Within 24 hours of first seeing this map, my football daft A-Level student had added the birthplaces of the 2008 European Champions. Not only does this provide a useful resource to illustrate how football has become more and more global, it also shows that students are not disengaged by the resource itself, but by the context in which the resource is used. The challenge lies not in persuading students of the importance of a resource or skill set, but in finding a context in which to present the resource which will engage all students.

Embed the you tube video

2008-07-13T15:50:00.000-07:00

If I paste the link from the address bar in you tube, wil the video be embedded in the blog?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vi-fQMGYyMo

Welcome to Geography 2.0

2008-07-13T15:31:00.000-07:00

Using digital technologies to enhance the teaching and learning of geography.
This clip is great - it is engaging and could be used to focus on a number of geographical concepts: