Explores the study of geography as a way to give students perspectives on their immediate surroundings and on the world as a whole. Geography is more about the connections between people than it is about the borders that divide them. Some examples illustrate innovative geography teaching techniques. (SLD)

Discusses how the teacher received a grant for an interdisciplinary unit on Russia. Addresses the importance of cross-curricular teaching in obtaining a grant. Provides five ideas to help teachers improve their chances of receiving a grant and offers a list of funding sources. (CMK)

Presents a lesson plan about the Keys' Desert Queen Ranch, located in the Joshua Tree National Park (California), that can be used in a unit on U.S. western expansion or desert environments. Explains students learn about life on a homestead and Ralph Waldo Emerson's ideas on self-reliance. (CMK)

Examined changing beliefs, practices, and reflections of two elementary teachers who engaged students in project-based learning in a technology-rich environment. Found core beliefs related to knowledge construction: (1) strategic knowledge of how to find and organize information is important; (2) construction of projects leads to constructing and…

Describes a graphing activity that promotes mathematical connections with social studies lessons. Students should be familiar with graphing on the Cartesian coordinate system to play this variation of the game Battleship on maps of various regions of the world. (AIM)

Addresses the teaching of environmental education in the British National Curriculum after the 1995 revisions. Environmental education is required only where it appears in National Curriculum subject requirements--geography and science in particular--but each individual school must decide how content is to be taught and what further action should…

Describes the instructional method, Client-Life Cycle GIS Project Learning, used in a course at Indiana University of Pennsylvania that enables students to learn with and about geographic information system (GIS). Discusses the course technical issues in GIS and an example project using this method. (CMK)

A new theory of geographical analysis--sociospatial knowledge networks--provides a framework for understanding the social and spatial locations of a community's health knowledge and beliefs. This theory is guiding an ethnographic study of health beliefs, knowledge, and knowledge networks in a diverse rural community at high risk for type-2…

Explores the evidence of nationalism, propaganda, and the treatment of war and peace in the school curriculum and textbooks within four countries during the end of the nineteenth century and beginning of the twentieth century: (1) Britain; (2) France; (3) Germany; and (4) the United States. (CMK)

Analyzes the teaching portfolios of eight novice geography teachers focusing on how useful portfolios are for teacher development, what the portfolios reveal about their teaching philosophies, what can be learned about the experience of novice teachers, and the extent of discipline-specific material present in the portfolios. (CMK)

Focuses on Perry School (Erie, Pennsylvania), the first geography theme-based elementary school in which everything is related to geography. Describes what students learn in each grade level and the expectations on what they should know. Reports on the creation of their geography learning lab. (CMK)

Describes the journal assignment used in the introductory course, "Geography and Civilization", focusing on each type of journal entry (class entries, course pack entries, novel entries, and current events). Discusses the last two entries as constructed more as finished essays than informal writing. Presents the results from a class survey. (CMK)

Reports the results from a 1999 survey conducted through phone interviews to identify which states were using assessments in social studies and to describe the types of assessments being used. Finds that two-thirds of the states conduct assessments in social studies while most assessments use objective questions. (CMK)

Describes efforts to improve the global-education curriculum during mid-1970s involving the teaching of foreign language, geography, and world history and the creation of public schools with an international focus; describes the use of extracurricular activities and technology to enhance global education; discusses challenges still facing the…

Describes an approach used by the Wayland, Massachusetts, middle school to organizing students into instructional teams. Explains that each instructional team is organized into a "house" named after a significant individual around whom the curriculum and theme for field trips is designed. Highlights the Rachel Carson House activities of…