Page 160 - Powerful Social Studies for Elementary Students 4th Edition

132 Powerful Social Studies for Elementary Students
cultures, and of the ways in which different groups of people interact with one another within regional contexts.
A resource unit on Mountain Regions is included as Appendix C to this book. It serves as an example to illustrate the possibilities of combining the physical and social aspects of geography built around the big ideas from the field. This unit could serve as a springboard for your planning, giving balanced attention to the five fundamental themes.
The National Geography Standards
Along with the five fundamental themes, the guidelines for geographic education identi- fied five basic geographical skills: (1) asking geographic questions (Where is it? Why is it there? What is important about its location and how does it relate to other locations?), (2) acquiring geographic information (e.g., from maps and databases), (3) organizing geographic information (e.g., using maps, models, and graphs to display the information in addition to summarizing it in text), (4) analyzing geographic information (e.g., inter- preting and drawing conclusions from geographic texts and displays), and (5) answering geographic questions (e.g., acquiring relevant information and using it to draw conclu- sions or make generalizations).
NCSS Standards Relating to Geography
The National Council for the Social Studies (2010) Curriculum Standards include a theme related to the five fundamental themes, People, Places, and Environments. In the early grades, it calls for experiences that allow students to construct and use mental maps of locales, regions, and the world that demonstrate understanding of relative location, direction, size, and shape; interpret, use, and distinguish various representations of the earth, such as maps, globes, and photographs; use appropriate resources, data sources, and geographic tools such as atlases, databases, grid systems, charts, graphs, and maps to generate, manipulate, and interpret information; estimate distance and calculate scale; locate and distinguish among varying landforms and geographic features such as mountains, plateaus, islands, and oceans; describe and speculate about physical system changes, such as seasons, climate and weather, and the water cycle; describe how people create places that reflect ideas, personality, culture, and wants and needs as they design homes, playgrounds, classrooms, and the like; examine the interaction of human beings and their physical environment, the use of land, building of cities, and ecosystem changes in selected locales and regions; explore ways that the earth’s physical features have changed over time in the local region and beyond and how these changes may be connected to one another; observe and speculate about social and economic effects of environmental changes and crises resulting from phenomena such as floods, storms, and drought; consider existing uses and propose and evaluate alternative uses of resources and land in home, school, community, the region, and beyond.
For the middle grades, additional activities related to this theme will allow students to create mental maps; create various representations of the earth; use appropriate resources, data sources, and geographic tools such as aerial photographs, satellite images, geographic information systems (GIS), map projections, and cartography to generate, manipulate, and interpret information such as atlases, databases, grid systems, charts, graphs, and maps; estimate distance, calculate scale, and distinguish other geographic relationships such as population density and spatial distribution patterns; locate and describe varying landforms and geographic features, such as mountains, plateaus, islands, rainforests, deserts, and oceans and explain their relationship within the ecosystem; iden- tify geographic patterns associated with physical system changes such as seasons, climate and weather, and the water cycle; describe how people create places that reflect cultural
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