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

2. 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.

3. 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.

4. 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.
                                                                        

5. 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.

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

7. 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.

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

9. 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.

10. The cornerstones of geographic inquiry
Location
Conditions
Connections
Region

11. 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.

12. 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.

13. 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.

14. 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

15. CONDITIONS
Comparisons of
regions can be
found in books.

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

17. 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.

18. CONNECTIONS
Immigration is a
common theme
in books.

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

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

21. 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.

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

23. REGIONS
Cajun Pigs
Hawaiian Pigs

24. 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.

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

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

27. TECHONOLOGICAL SUPPORT

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

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

30. 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.