US Students Still Poor at Geography

You don't need to know the world when you're the center of it...

 

I got a 100% when I did the 12th grade but I have to admit local (I live in Wisconsin) knowledge helped me with one of the questions.


Geography may not be the most important skill-you don't need to know it in order to balance a checkbook, fix a computer, or a bunch of other things.

But it is one of those general knowledge things that may be good just to know. Plus lack of geographical knowledge can end up making one look really stupid if displayed in public and/or in relation to a major issue/situation.

I have to thank a WW2 Board Game for helping me learn about European national geography back when.

 

I got one of the grade 12 questions wrong because I really don't know the relative height above sea level for all the Continents. Most of the questions should be answerable to the target students. The idea that so many bombed is deeply depressing.

 

I took the 12th grade test, got them all right, but I must say that 3 of the 5 questions presented were, at best, tangentally related to geography. The world map question and the layout of South America are geography questions. The other ones are not, IMO.

There was a question on why people immigrate. Other than the fact that immigrants go from one place on the planet to another, that's more of a sociology question than a geography question.

On the desertification of East Africa affecting women more than men, that's a mixture of sociology and environmental science.

Finally, that the air is cooler than large bodies of water in the early winter, that's a mixture of environmental science and ecology - not geography. (Note: the study of ecology as a field has more to do with weather patterns, climate, and habitats than it does "going green" and "save the earth" stuff.)

 

As part of my degree, I ended up in a geography class. But it wasn't physical geography -- iirc it was called human geography. It was kind of cool. Dealt with the stuff you mentioned -- migration, land use, the effect of geographical features on cultures, and the converse as well.

On another note, I took some other sample questions from other subjects. Didn't do too badly!

 

That is geography Aldeth, sociology deals with individual and to some extent societies. More advanced geography deals with the impact people have on the land, the impact the land have on people, how we change our geography and the general interaction between the geography and people amongst other things. I got all of them right on the 12th grade but I must say that it was some pretty advanced stuff and I shot from the hip on a few of them. Geography as a subject is a lot more than maps and borders though.

 

I guess that goes to show why Americans are poor with geography - we don't even define geography as you do. Although -

Sure sounds like that would apply to the question on the African women.

I never took anything other than basic history and geography courses, but I have taken college level environmental science courses, and some of that other stuff was definitely covered there. I know that geography is more than just nations, capitals, borders, and land features, but my point is that in the US, that's pretty much all we cover.

 

Today 'US Students Poor At Geography', tomorrow 'Bears take poos in the woods - exposed!'.

 

Don't Americans obsess over knowing the capital cities of every state in the Union? I've always felt that's low level memorization at its worst. i think it's much more important to know what kind of industries a State has, what kind of landscape it has, what kind of history it has, and other such higher level concepts.

At low grades, it might be good for instilling memorization and study skills, mind you, but whatever.

 

I don't have the capital of every state memorized, although I do know most of them. However, if you gave me a map of the US with none of the state names filled in, I could certainly do that. AFAIK, having to memorize state capitals is consider archaic - probably for the reasons you state.

Also, because of the tradition of putting the state capital more or less in the center of the state, it's not uncommon for the state capital to not be even a particularly important city within the state. Look at Maryland - it's biggest city is Baltimore, but Annapolis is the capital. You'd think that either Philly or Pittsburgh would be the capital of PA, but it's Harrisburg. Albany cannot possibly be one of NY's biggest cities... and the list goes on.