Digital Earth (DE) education provides students with geospatial knowledge and skills to locate, me... more Digital Earth (DE) education provides students with geospatial knowledge and skills to locate, measure, and solve geographic problems on Earth’s surface. The rapid development of geospatial technology has promoted a new vision of DE to embrace data infrastructure, social networks, citizen science, and human processes on Earth. The high demand for a geospatial workforce also calls for an ever-changing, diverse form of learning experiences. Limited efforts, however, have been made regarding DE education to adapt to this changing landscape, with most interventions falling short of expectations. This chapter gives an overview of current teaching and learning structures with DE technologies. Successes and obstacles for K-12 education are explored first, followed by classroom technologies and experiential learning and outreach exercises such as academic certificates and internships in higher education. Taking the geospatial intelligence model from the U.S. Geospatial Intelligence Foundati...
To Mom and Dad, who instilled in me the importance of perseverance and a positive attitude in eve... more To Mom and Dad, who instilled in me the importance of perseverance and a positive attitude in everything I do. I am forever grateful for your unconditional love and support, as well as the many sacrifices you make that allow me to follow my dreams. Also, to my big brother, Jake, who will always be my greatest role model and biggest fan. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to sincerely thank several people who supported me throughout this process. I must first thank my advisor, Dr. Jerry Mitchell, who helped me realize my passion for geography education while offering his guidance and dedicated support. I also wish to thank Dr. Sarah Battersby and Dr. John Kupfer for serving as my committee members. Their time, expertise, and constructive feedback were invaluable. My sincerest thanks to the Geography department for securing the funding that allowed me to pursue this degree. This work was supported in part by funding from the National Park Service through Task Agreement J5240 10 0011 (Kupfer et al.: Climate Change-Induced Changes in Flow Regime, Floodplain Inundation and Species Habitats at Congaree National Park). I must also acknowledge my fellow Geography graduate students. A special shout out goes to Larianne, Amelia, Kim, Chris, and Aashka. My graduate school experience was made all the more special by their friendship, fresh perspectives, and happy hour shenanigans. Lastly, thank you to my fiancée, Kendell. I would have struggled to finish this thesis without his patience, support, and love. Now that I have finished writing, we can finally get to work on our growing Netflix queue.
Review of International Geographical Education Online
In 2019, the State of South Carolina (USA) adopted new social studies standards with an emphasis ... more In 2019, the State of South Carolina (USA) adopted new social studies standards with an emphasis on disciplinary skills in addition to content throughout the social studies areas of history, geography, civics, and economics. These skills were introduced for all grades, kindergarten through grade 12. Geography courses were added in grades 3 and 7. The standards specify and deconstruct six geography skills to be taught in these classrooms. These skills include Mapping; Models and Representations; Gather Evidence and Communicate Findings; Conditions, Connections, and Regions; Scale; and Distribution and Pattern. Social studies coordinators at the school district level were interviewed on the successes and obstacles teachers are experiencing, and on what future actions were being considered to address these skills in teaching.
I am an Ironman. For the uninitiated, this means that I have completed a 140.6-mile triathlon. Mi... more I am an Ironman. For the uninitiated, this means that I have completed a 140.6-mile triathlon. Mine consisted of a 2.4-mile ocean swim, a 112-mile bike ride, and a 26.2-mile marathon run. As you ca...
After a disaster, there is an urgent need for information on population mobility. Our analysis ex... more After a disaster, there is an urgent need for information on population mobility. Our analysis examines the suitability of Twitter data for measuring post-disaster population mobility using the case of Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico. Among Twitter users living in Puerto Rico, we show how many were displaced, the timing and destination of their displacement, and whether they returned. Among Twitter users arriving in Puerto Rico after the disaster, we show the timing and destination of their trips. We find that 8.3% of resident sample relocated during the months after Hurricane Maria and nearly 4% of were still displaced 9 months later. Visitors to Puerto Rico fell significantly in the year after Hurricane Maria, especially in tourist areas. While our Twitter data is not representative of the Puerto Rican population, it provides broad evidence of the effect of this disaster on population mobility and suggests further potential use.
International Research in Geographical and Environmental Education, 2018
This article explores teacher training in geographic information system (GIS) and hopes to uncove... more This article explores teacher training in geographic information system (GIS) and hopes to uncover the necessary elements required for long-term and sustained use of GIS in the K-12 classroom. A variety of models have been proposed for successful GIS professional development including long-term teacher training lasting up to a year in length. Our study takes an additional step by following up with teachers over a full year after they have completed training to determine if they are continuing to teach with GIS and if so, how. We find there remains a disconnect between providing GIS teacher professional development and actually seeing long-term classroom implementation. We offer three recommendations for transformation in teacher practice: pre-service teacher geography and GIS intervention, continuous follow-up and coaching, and including GIS in Academic Standards.
The Journal of Geography has used key words since 1990 to help readers and researchers seek out w... more The Journal of Geography has used key words since 1990 to help readers and researchers seek out work of particular interest. Key words generally supplement article titles and are hopefully chosen with care. The focus of this article is the Journal of Geography key word, its presence, timing, and frequency. Using a twenty-five-year dataset that spans 150 issues, we investigated the key words appearing the most, identified subdisciplinary areas with more attention, and make suggestions for improving key word usage.
Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast in August 2005 with devastating consequences. Almos... more Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast in August 2005 with devastating consequences. Almost all analyses of the disaster have been dedicated to the way the hurricane affected New Orleans. This volume examines the impact of Katrina on southern Mississippi. While communities along Mississippi's Gulf Coast shared the impact, their socioeconomic and demographic compositions varied widely, leading to different types and rates of recovery. This volume furthers our understanding of the pace of recovery and its geographic extent, and explores the role of inequalities in the recovery process and those antecedent conditions that could give rise to a 'recovery divide'. It will be especially appealing to researchers and advanced students of natural disasters and policy makers dealing with disaster consequences and recovery.
Climate change is a wicked problem, defying simple resolution. Education in various forms and at ... more Climate change is a wicked problem, defying simple resolution. Education in various forms and at various levels has sought to improve understanding and stimulate climate change action in young people. There exists, however, a certain wickedness in education systems as well that makes climate change education difficult to enact successfully. These include an unsupportive education environment where academic standards related to climate change are missing, the lack of an inquiry-based pedagogy that can be well-suited to investigating topics like climate change with no easy answers, and ill-prepared teachers who do not fully know both the physical science and social aspects of the topic. A review of education standards in the United States and the literature on the latter two issues is used to make the argument that it is the geography classroom that can serve as the best unifying space that is most supportive of holistic and meaningful climate change education. This future is possible...
Bridges are some of the most majestic features in the American landscape. Where Sydney, Australia... more Bridges are some of the most majestic features in the American landscape. Where Sydney, Australia, has an iconic opera house and Paris has a monumental tower, in San Francisco, Brooklyn, and many other cities, a bridge is the defining landmark. These engineering marvels—many several miles in length and hundreds of feet tall—connect the inaccessible, and dramatically alter the relationships between newly-joined spaces. For our classrooms, the bridge serves as an important component of one of the main themes of geography: movement. The Greater New York City area is home to many bridges, including the Verrazano-Narrows, the George Washington, and the aforementioned Brooklyn Bridge. They are the connective arteries through which the city’s lifeblood flows. One bridge, north of Manhattan and crossing the Hudson River, is the Tappan Zee. The Tappan Zee Bridge (Tappan was the name of an area Native American tribe and zee the Dutch word for sea) was opened in 1955 and is a fairly non-descri...
How to improve geography education via teacher preparation programs has been a concern for nearly... more How to improve geography education via teacher preparation programs has been a concern for nearly three decades, but few examples of a single, comprehensive university-level course exist. The purpose of this article is to share the model of a pre-service geography education methods course. Within the course, geography content (physical and social) is paired with different pedagogic strategies (visual, kinesthetic, technology) and other content areas (reading, history) to refine pre-service teacher conceptualizations of geography as a subject and to see geography's potential inclusion across various grade levels. End of course student evaluations demonstrate student satisfaction and learning, while post-course interviews similarly indicate that the class was (1) more useful and practical than other education program coursework for beginning ones teaching career, and (2) stimulated the continued use of geographic concepts and materials.
University faculty partners from the Departments of Geography and Instruction and Teacher Educati... more University faculty partners from the Departments of Geography and Instruction and Teacher Education at a large, public university collaborated with K-12 teachers and the leadership of a rural school district in order to investigate the crosscutting content of science, mathematics, and geography through the integration of web-based GIS technologies. The project explored the critical connections among technology, pedagogy, and content with a particular emphasis on developing technology-enhanced, inquiry-based lessons in which the teachers and their students used GIS technologies to analyze, visualize, and present data in real-world contexts. The findings highlight the importance of well-structured professional development that builds community, integrates diverse content and pedagogical expertise, provides feedback and coaching, and is of sufficient duration to effect change.
Geographic education is crucial for preparing students to navigate the places and spaces they inh... more Geographic education is crucial for preparing students to navigate the places and spaces they inhabit, and National Geographic’s Giant Traveling Map program seeks to address this need by providing an immersive and kinesthetic learning experience with the use of a gym-sized floor map . In this study, a Giant Traveling Map was tested with sixth grade students to determine the effect of engaging with the map on improving spatial thinking skills . Questions were drawn from the Spatial Thinking Ability Test to assess students’ skills preand post-experience . Our results show minimal improvement for a few very specific spatial thinking skills and raise questions concerning the testing of spatial concepts and tying in assessment to map activities and geographic learning . We conclude that more study is needed to accurately evaluate the Giant Traveling Map Program for its educational impact .
Digital Earth (DE) education provides students with geospatial knowledge and skills to locate, me... more Digital Earth (DE) education provides students with geospatial knowledge and skills to locate, measure, and solve geographic problems on Earth’s surface. The rapid development of geospatial technology has promoted a new vision of DE to embrace data infrastructure, social networks, citizen science, and human processes on Earth. The high demand for a geospatial workforce also calls for an ever-changing, diverse form of learning experiences. Limited efforts, however, have been made regarding DE education to adapt to this changing landscape, with most interventions falling short of expectations. This chapter gives an overview of current teaching and learning structures with DE technologies. Successes and obstacles for K-12 education are explored first, followed by classroom technologies and experiential learning and outreach exercises such as academic certificates and internships in higher education. Taking the geospatial intelligence model from the U.S. Geospatial Intelligence Foundati...
To Mom and Dad, who instilled in me the importance of perseverance and a positive attitude in eve... more To Mom and Dad, who instilled in me the importance of perseverance and a positive attitude in everything I do. I am forever grateful for your unconditional love and support, as well as the many sacrifices you make that allow me to follow my dreams. Also, to my big brother, Jake, who will always be my greatest role model and biggest fan. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to sincerely thank several people who supported me throughout this process. I must first thank my advisor, Dr. Jerry Mitchell, who helped me realize my passion for geography education while offering his guidance and dedicated support. I also wish to thank Dr. Sarah Battersby and Dr. John Kupfer for serving as my committee members. Their time, expertise, and constructive feedback were invaluable. My sincerest thanks to the Geography department for securing the funding that allowed me to pursue this degree. This work was supported in part by funding from the National Park Service through Task Agreement J5240 10 0011 (Kupfer et al.: Climate Change-Induced Changes in Flow Regime, Floodplain Inundation and Species Habitats at Congaree National Park). I must also acknowledge my fellow Geography graduate students. A special shout out goes to Larianne, Amelia, Kim, Chris, and Aashka. My graduate school experience was made all the more special by their friendship, fresh perspectives, and happy hour shenanigans. Lastly, thank you to my fiancée, Kendell. I would have struggled to finish this thesis without his patience, support, and love. Now that I have finished writing, we can finally get to work on our growing Netflix queue.
Review of International Geographical Education Online
In 2019, the State of South Carolina (USA) adopted new social studies standards with an emphasis ... more In 2019, the State of South Carolina (USA) adopted new social studies standards with an emphasis on disciplinary skills in addition to content throughout the social studies areas of history, geography, civics, and economics. These skills were introduced for all grades, kindergarten through grade 12. Geography courses were added in grades 3 and 7. The standards specify and deconstruct six geography skills to be taught in these classrooms. These skills include Mapping; Models and Representations; Gather Evidence and Communicate Findings; Conditions, Connections, and Regions; Scale; and Distribution and Pattern. Social studies coordinators at the school district level were interviewed on the successes and obstacles teachers are experiencing, and on what future actions were being considered to address these skills in teaching.
I am an Ironman. For the uninitiated, this means that I have completed a 140.6-mile triathlon. Mi... more I am an Ironman. For the uninitiated, this means that I have completed a 140.6-mile triathlon. Mine consisted of a 2.4-mile ocean swim, a 112-mile bike ride, and a 26.2-mile marathon run. As you ca...
After a disaster, there is an urgent need for information on population mobility. Our analysis ex... more After a disaster, there is an urgent need for information on population mobility. Our analysis examines the suitability of Twitter data for measuring post-disaster population mobility using the case of Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico. Among Twitter users living in Puerto Rico, we show how many were displaced, the timing and destination of their displacement, and whether they returned. Among Twitter users arriving in Puerto Rico after the disaster, we show the timing and destination of their trips. We find that 8.3% of resident sample relocated during the months after Hurricane Maria and nearly 4% of were still displaced 9 months later. Visitors to Puerto Rico fell significantly in the year after Hurricane Maria, especially in tourist areas. While our Twitter data is not representative of the Puerto Rican population, it provides broad evidence of the effect of this disaster on population mobility and suggests further potential use.
International Research in Geographical and Environmental Education, 2018
This article explores teacher training in geographic information system (GIS) and hopes to uncove... more This article explores teacher training in geographic information system (GIS) and hopes to uncover the necessary elements required for long-term and sustained use of GIS in the K-12 classroom. A variety of models have been proposed for successful GIS professional development including long-term teacher training lasting up to a year in length. Our study takes an additional step by following up with teachers over a full year after they have completed training to determine if they are continuing to teach with GIS and if so, how. We find there remains a disconnect between providing GIS teacher professional development and actually seeing long-term classroom implementation. We offer three recommendations for transformation in teacher practice: pre-service teacher geography and GIS intervention, continuous follow-up and coaching, and including GIS in Academic Standards.
The Journal of Geography has used key words since 1990 to help readers and researchers seek out w... more The Journal of Geography has used key words since 1990 to help readers and researchers seek out work of particular interest. Key words generally supplement article titles and are hopefully chosen with care. The focus of this article is the Journal of Geography key word, its presence, timing, and frequency. Using a twenty-five-year dataset that spans 150 issues, we investigated the key words appearing the most, identified subdisciplinary areas with more attention, and make suggestions for improving key word usage.
Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast in August 2005 with devastating consequences. Almos... more Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast in August 2005 with devastating consequences. Almost all analyses of the disaster have been dedicated to the way the hurricane affected New Orleans. This volume examines the impact of Katrina on southern Mississippi. While communities along Mississippi's Gulf Coast shared the impact, their socioeconomic and demographic compositions varied widely, leading to different types and rates of recovery. This volume furthers our understanding of the pace of recovery and its geographic extent, and explores the role of inequalities in the recovery process and those antecedent conditions that could give rise to a 'recovery divide'. It will be especially appealing to researchers and advanced students of natural disasters and policy makers dealing with disaster consequences and recovery.
Climate change is a wicked problem, defying simple resolution. Education in various forms and at ... more Climate change is a wicked problem, defying simple resolution. Education in various forms and at various levels has sought to improve understanding and stimulate climate change action in young people. There exists, however, a certain wickedness in education systems as well that makes climate change education difficult to enact successfully. These include an unsupportive education environment where academic standards related to climate change are missing, the lack of an inquiry-based pedagogy that can be well-suited to investigating topics like climate change with no easy answers, and ill-prepared teachers who do not fully know both the physical science and social aspects of the topic. A review of education standards in the United States and the literature on the latter two issues is used to make the argument that it is the geography classroom that can serve as the best unifying space that is most supportive of holistic and meaningful climate change education. This future is possible...
Bridges are some of the most majestic features in the American landscape. Where Sydney, Australia... more Bridges are some of the most majestic features in the American landscape. Where Sydney, Australia, has an iconic opera house and Paris has a monumental tower, in San Francisco, Brooklyn, and many other cities, a bridge is the defining landmark. These engineering marvels—many several miles in length and hundreds of feet tall—connect the inaccessible, and dramatically alter the relationships between newly-joined spaces. For our classrooms, the bridge serves as an important component of one of the main themes of geography: movement. The Greater New York City area is home to many bridges, including the Verrazano-Narrows, the George Washington, and the aforementioned Brooklyn Bridge. They are the connective arteries through which the city’s lifeblood flows. One bridge, north of Manhattan and crossing the Hudson River, is the Tappan Zee. The Tappan Zee Bridge (Tappan was the name of an area Native American tribe and zee the Dutch word for sea) was opened in 1955 and is a fairly non-descri...
How to improve geography education via teacher preparation programs has been a concern for nearly... more How to improve geography education via teacher preparation programs has been a concern for nearly three decades, but few examples of a single, comprehensive university-level course exist. The purpose of this article is to share the model of a pre-service geography education methods course. Within the course, geography content (physical and social) is paired with different pedagogic strategies (visual, kinesthetic, technology) and other content areas (reading, history) to refine pre-service teacher conceptualizations of geography as a subject and to see geography's potential inclusion across various grade levels. End of course student evaluations demonstrate student satisfaction and learning, while post-course interviews similarly indicate that the class was (1) more useful and practical than other education program coursework for beginning ones teaching career, and (2) stimulated the continued use of geographic concepts and materials.
University faculty partners from the Departments of Geography and Instruction and Teacher Educati... more University faculty partners from the Departments of Geography and Instruction and Teacher Education at a large, public university collaborated with K-12 teachers and the leadership of a rural school district in order to investigate the crosscutting content of science, mathematics, and geography through the integration of web-based GIS technologies. The project explored the critical connections among technology, pedagogy, and content with a particular emphasis on developing technology-enhanced, inquiry-based lessons in which the teachers and their students used GIS technologies to analyze, visualize, and present data in real-world contexts. The findings highlight the importance of well-structured professional development that builds community, integrates diverse content and pedagogical expertise, provides feedback and coaching, and is of sufficient duration to effect change.
Geographic education is crucial for preparing students to navigate the places and spaces they inh... more Geographic education is crucial for preparing students to navigate the places and spaces they inhabit, and National Geographic’s Giant Traveling Map program seeks to address this need by providing an immersive and kinesthetic learning experience with the use of a gym-sized floor map . In this study, a Giant Traveling Map was tested with sixth grade students to determine the effect of engaging with the map on improving spatial thinking skills . Questions were drawn from the Spatial Thinking Ability Test to assess students’ skills preand post-experience . Our results show minimal improvement for a few very specific spatial thinking skills and raise questions concerning the testing of spatial concepts and tying in assessment to map activities and geographic learning . We conclude that more study is needed to accurately evaluate the Giant Traveling Map Program for its educational impact .
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