GEOGRAPHY AND LITERATURE GEOLITERACY WORKSHOP September 12, 2009 Steve Jennings Associate Professor Geography and Environmental Studies

GEOLITERACY The role of geography is to develop an understanding of the spatial relationships that affect our lives every day. One way method that has great impact on students is the combination of books and geography.

GEOLITERACY What are the reasons for combining reading and geography? 1. Limited time in the classroom to cover all subjects. 2. The natural fit between books that describe places on the Earth’s surface and geography. 3. The chance to “travel” to far away places and times.

GEOLITERACY Well written books commonly have strongly developed descriptions of the location of the book. These books evoke a strong sense of time and place, filling in the spaces that might not be readily apparent from maps and photographs of the same region.                                                                           

GEOLITERACY Works of fiction such as the Hunchback of Notre Dame, Moby Dick, or Wuthering Heights gain a great deal of verisimilitude from the description of the book’s setting.

GEOLITERACY Nonfiction books like Blue Highways or Travels With Charley are great descriptions of the geography of the U.S.

GEOLITERACY Many excellent children’s books have the same characteristics. It is important to connect and excite students about interesting places and times. Engaging students with reading is a way to hook students so that they learn a variety of skills and content.

RESOURCE An excellent resource about geography and how to develop a content rich curriculum is Phil Gersmehl’s book, Teaching Geography.

THEMES Using the terms in this book we can explore the relationship between books and geography. These terms are similar to the five themes of geography with the deletion of Human-environment interaction, since Gersmehl believes that that theme is contained in all the others.

The cornerstones of geographic inquiry Location Conditions Connections Region

LOCATION It is important to know where something is on the Earth’s surface because of its relationship to other things. Location can be expressed as an absolute location or a relative location.

LOCATION Atlases are essential in every classroom just as dictionaries are. The ability to refer to locations in an atlas is essential in developing sense of place.

CONDITIONS Once a place is located on the Earth’s surface the next step is to describe the characteristics of that place. These characteristics are numerous for any place. These include physical characteristics such as elevation or average temperature and cultural characteristics such as language and economic activity.

CONDITIONS I have heard of a land Where the earth is red with promises Where the redbud trees catch the light And throw it in a game of sunbeams and shadow Back and forth to the cottonwood trees

CONDITIONS Comparisons of regions can be found in books.

CONDITIONS Environmental conditions can be the subject that helps to define the conditions in regions.

CONNECTIONS Each location is connected in some way to other locations. Sometimes the connections are economic, other times they are defined by a belief system or kinship links. Connections can be strong or weak, but the connections are always there. No place is completely isolated.

CONNECTIONS Immigration is a common theme in books.

CONNECTIONS The travels of people through unknown lands can engage students and by supported by a variety of other resources.

CONNECTIONS Books geared for adults may be a source of pictures and maps.

REGIONS Regions can be classified into three broad categories. Formal regions Functional regions Perceptual regions Each of this types are widely recognized in the geography community and have well defined characteristics.

REGIONS Retelling of familiar tales in regional ways is common. Southwestern Pigs

REGIONS Cajun Pigs Hawaiian Pigs

CREATIVE CARTOGRAPHY Another approach to geography is to ask the students to create maps of imaginary places. This exercise helps students to think about the relationships between features and how to visualize the common kinds of arrangement of places on the Earth’s surface.

CREATIVE CARTOGRAPHY Robert Louis Stevenson’s map of Treasure island preceded the writing of the book.

CREATIVE CARTOGRAPHY While a map may be whimsical there still is a logical distribution of features

TECHONOLOGICAL SUPPORT

TECHONOLOGICAL SUPPORT The path of the duck family in Make Way For Ducklings has been mapped out in Lit Trips.

TECHONOLOGICAL SUPPORT By clicking on locations on the path additional information pops up.

TECHONOLOGICAL SUPPORT Students who are interested in computer technology in the higher elementary grades can make their own Lit Trips. Lit Trips may engage students who are more interested in electronic media and get them to read books.