Geography: It's more than where you live

As I reflect on my recent practicum with grade 8 students, I can't help but think about graduation looming on the horizon. Each classroom interaction becomes a milestone in my journey toward becoming an educator. But before I digress any further, I'd like to share more about last week's lesson. The students and I delved into Strand A: Global Settlement: Patterns and Sustainability in the Ontario grade 8 curriculum. This introductory class served as a foundational exploration of fundamental geographical concepts, including Patterns and Trends, Spatial Significance, Interrelationships, and Geographic Perspectives.

With the help of my mentor teacher, I devised a note-taking sheet to scaffold students' learning experiences. Recognizing note-taking as an essential skill, I sought to empower my grade 8 students as active learners and organized thinkers as they prepare to transition into high school. Some information on the sheet were drawn from the slides I designed for the lesson and students are guided to add additional notes

By providing structured notes (Fig 1, right) initially and gradually transitioning to independent note-taking, students are equipped to navigate academic challenges with confidence (the red notes are blank for students to fill out. This is the teacher's copy). Please go to my lesson plans and click on Social Studies, History and Geography to see the details of this lesson.

Each slide covered one of the four geographic concepts complemented by illustrative examples for analysis. One slide depicted a plan illustrating the straightening of the Don River as it flows into Lake Ontario in Toronto, Canada.

This map (Fig 2, left) serves as a springboard for discussing the spatial significance of geographical features and their influence on industrial development. This is one example that will be explored further to analyze the spatial significance of major cities, rivers, and ecosystems and the impact on human activity. Overall, my lesson was a primer to the unit that provided students with key concepts to explore. This unit like many in the curriculum, encourages critical thinking, spatial analysis, and interdisciplinary explorations of issues that affects us all in our daily lives. Geography is one of them.

Sources:

Figure 2: 'River Don Straightening Plan' Unwin, Browne and Sankey, Surveyors (May 7, 1888). River Don Straightening Plan, showing lands to be expropriated. City of Toronto Archives, Series 725, File 12.