Basis and Teaching of Geography - LEZIONE (2019/2020)

Learning outcomes

Considering the need of kindergarten and primary school children to develop skills and abilities specific to Geography, we will first discuss its foundations, paradigms, concepts and methods, key topics (from an evolutionary perspective).
On the basis of age and adopting a multiscalar / transcalar approach, effective teaching allows children to develop attention to the surrounding world. This is crucial in order to raise their awareness and translate the experience into spatial and territorial knowledge. We aim, therefore, to teach students how to set up a teaching method for children to develop an acute - and critical - ability to observe natural and human settings (a capacity both direct and mediated by tools used to enrich contents). Providing appropriate indications, we will insist on the need for future teachers to continuously update their knowledge base adopting a (theoretical, applied and experiential) lifelong learning approach.
The course is divided into two parts (A and B).

Part A:
• An Introduction
1. A definition of Geography
2. Human Geography and Physical Geography
3. The branches of Geography
• Key concepts in Geography:
1. Time, space, site, place, territory, scale, landscape, region
2. Spatial diffusion/distribution/variation/correlation/interaction
(all key terms that inform the language of Geography and define the geographical imagination as well as analysis)
• The tools of Geography
1. Qualitative and quantitative data (analysis)
2. An introduction to traditional cartography and to GIS (geographical information systems)
• Nature-Culture dualism (from an evolutionary perspective)
• The ecosystems and society - environment interactions
1. An introduction to the causes and consequences of human-induced environmental degradation concentrated in regions and places distributed throughout the planet
• Populations and migrations
• Cultural Geography in relation to the phenomenon of globalization
• Geography and Development
• Geography and Agriculture
• Key concepts (and phenomena) of Industrial Geography, Transport Geography, and the Geography of the tertiary sector
• Key concepts and trends of tourism
• Key concepts of Urban Geography (useful to interpret the urban
landscape in its elements, relations, and changes)
• Key concepts of Political Geography

Part B:
- Geography tools and resources: their use for teaching purposes
- The planning of:
1. an educational guided visit
2. a geographic itinerary (according to age)
- Continuing education and professional training
- The development of a geographical curriculum of basic education
- Main criteria to choose a textbook

In the teaching laboratory, individual or group activities will be proposed in order to translate the program into practice (f.i.: exercises on images and cartographies as well as interactive games and dedicated software).

Planned learning activities and teaching methods (for both modules):
- Frontal lectures
- Seminars on selected themes may be organized [experts - researchers and/or practitioners – may be invited to give seminars on specific topics]
NB: we will use case studies and internet for demonstration purposes. In order to raise students’ awareness of the existing resources, we will make use of the material available in the University Libraries and in the website of the Italian Geography Teachers Association (AIIG)

- Written exam: open questions and multiple choices (equal to the attendees and not).
- The final exam aims to assess:
o the knowledge of the topics
o the capacity and exhaustiveness of the geographical discourse
o the capacity to link the geographical knowledge acquired with the one developed in other disciplinary domains
o the capacity of transforming knowledge into abilities.
NB: Students who do not pass the exam can participate in the following one. Registration to the exam is mandatory according to the official procedures of the faculty.