Topic: What is geography?

Author: Magdalena Jankun

Target group

5th grade students of an elementary school

Core curriculum

I. In terms of geographical knowledge:

1. learning the basic geographical vocabulary to describe and explain the phenomena and processes that occur in the geographical environment.

2. understanding the correlations between elements of the natural and socio‑economic environment as well as relations and dependencies in the geographical environment on a local, regional, and global scale.

The general aim of education

Learn what geography is and how it is divided.

Criteria of success

• explain what geography is;

• learn how geography is classified;

• describe what physical, economic, and regional geography is.

Key competences

• communication in the mother tongue;

• communication in foreign languages;

• digital competence;

• learning to learn;

• social and civic competences.

Methods/forms of work

• using ICT tools;

• activity with educational material and multimedia on the e‑podreczniki platform;

• brainstorming;

• individual activity, activity in pairs, and collective activity.

Teaching aids

• e‑textbook for teaching geography;

• interactive whiteboard;

• multimedia projector;

• tablets/computers.

Lesson plan overview (Process)

Introduction

1. The teacher informs the students about the purpose of the lesson, presents the criteria of success.

2. The lesson starts with brainstorming. The teacher asks the students what comes to their mind when they think of geography. The question is directed towards everyone in the class. As an introduction to the method, the teacher can use the interactive whiteboard mentioned in the abstract “What is geography”. Discussion.

Realization

1. The teacher explains the origin of the word geography: from the Greek word GEO meaning Earth, and GRAPHO - I describe.

2. Students, using various sources, such as a  geography textbook, e‑textbook or the internet, explain what geography is, deepening their existing knowledge. Work in pairs. Creating an uniform definition.

3. The teacher indicates the pairs who present their insights on the class forum.

4. Work with abstract. Reading material with discussion.

5. The teacher pays attention to the geography breakdown scheme. Structured interview. Students read aloud what the following branches are: physical geography, economic geography, regional geography, cartography. The teacher gives examples of disciplines that are part of physical geography, for example astronomy, hydrology, geomorphology, oceanography, climatology and meteorology, pedology, biogeography. Students try to explain what each discipline covers. The teacher specifies the answers.

6. Interactive exercise: connect in pairs the right branch of physical geography with the correct scope of activities. Selected students go to the interactive whiteboard.

Summary

The teacher summarizes the students’ work in class. A survey can be used with sample sentences to fill in:

• On today's lesson I have learnt that...

• I was surprised that...

• I would like to learn more about...

The following terms and recordings will be used during this lesson

Terms

Texts and recordings

What does geography deal with?

Geography is a new school subject to you. However, during the first classes you will find out that some of the topics you are already familiar with. How is this possible? They have already appeared during science lessons at your primary school. From now on, you will be learning geography properly. Get ready for a fascinating adventure.

Geography is a science that deals with the diversity of the earth's surface, mutual relations between its components and human activity related to them. The name of this scientific discipline comes from the combination of the Greek words geos – which means ″earth″ and grapho, which means ″write, describe″. At the beginning, the geographers collected basic information about our planet, e.g. about the layout of lands and seas, mountains, rivers, etc. Nowadays, they are studying the earth's surface, both in terms of nature, as well as socio‑economic aspects, as well as spatial relationships that occur between the earth's surface and human activity.

The modern geography has been divided by geographists into two branches depending on the detailed field of study:

• physical geography that examines natural processes and components of the earth's layers;

• economic geography (i.e. socio‑economic geography) that examines the impact of human economic activity on the Earth and the impact of natural factors on human activity

Some researchers also distinguish two more branches: - a regional geography that combines elements of physical and economic geography and emphasises the overall presentation of the geographical regions;

• cartography, i.e. the science of making maps.