Geography

About the Course • This semester-long course provides instruction and measurement of

student learning in high school-level geography. The Delaware high school Geography benchmarks may be found online at www.doe.k12.de.us/ss and are also referenced below in the syllabus. The context for this course is contemporary and practical, drawing from problems encountered and solutions reached in local communities.

• The course is divided into four main sections, each based on one of the overarching Geography Standards. Each week of the course is divided into lessons. Several lessons are based on The Delaware Geography Health Initiative, a set of instructional tools aligned to Delaware Geography Standards in grades 9-12. In this course, students apply the knowledge, skills and perspectives of geography. They research problems, analyze data, and suggest solutions using a GIS-based approach.

GIS and Remote Sensing

Delaware Geographic AllianceUniversity of Delaware

Houston, TX; Landsat-7

What is a GIS?

• GIS stands for Geographic Information System

• A tool people can use to map and analyze geographic data

• Organizes data by where it occurs

Why is Geography Important?

• Our activities and decisions involve location in some way

• Examples: – Where to buy bread on the way home from

work– Where to build new roads or hospitals

What is Remote Sensing?

• Geographers use pictures taken from satellites and sensors to help solve everyday problems.

• Examples include aerial imagery, infrared (IR) and microwave sensors, and sonar, but there are many more!

• This is known as remote sensing

How can we use remote sensing?Some of the ways (but not all!)

we can use remote sensing:

• Weather• Land use• Populations of organisms in

the ocean• Monitoring sea ice

Bathurst Island, Nunavut, CanadaA- waterB- siltstone C- limestone

What agencies might use remote sensing?

• Weather forecasters• Foresters• Agriculture• Ocean researchers• Biologists• Polar researchers

Provided by the SeaWiFS Project, NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, and ORBIMAGE

An example

• One way that remote sensing can be used is in tracking land use changes through time.

This is an aerial picture of the Christiana Mall as it looks today. But it didn’t always look that way!

This is the mall in 2007. Can you spot any

changes between 2007 and 2011?

Here is a picture of the mall from 1997. The changes between 2007 and 2011 may be hard to spot, but changes are

easily seen when comparing 1997.

1997

• Remote sensing can also be used to detect vegetation and land types and even natural disasters.

• When using an infrared (IR) sensor, vegetation appears bright red and is easy to spot.

• IR sensors also allow tornado tracks to be easily seen.

LANDSAT ETM+ IR composite image of

Delaware Inland Bays

Photo from NASA Science News; ASTER sensor

Remote sensing and GIS together

• We can combine remote sensing and GIS together for analysis

• Example: – Looking at

bicycle and pedestrian safety in Newark

Think About It

• Where do you think the camera was positioned to take aerial shots of Christiana Mall in 2007? In 1997?

• What is the best source for aerial photos and remote sensing images of our local area?

• Where can we access aerial images of other areas of the US and the world?

Geography Pre-Test

No Talking

Write on your own paper

June Bugs

• Lesson Essential Question – – What geographic patterns emerge when you

map data? – What can analyzing the data tell about the

map?

• Vocabulary

Accessibility

Geographically

June Bugs

• Geography High School Standard Benchmark Addressed– Standard One: MAPS. 9-12a. Students will identify geographic

patterns which emerge when data is mapped, and analyze mapped patterns…..

• Learning objectives– Learn how to organize data into categories

and then use those data to produce a thematic map.

– Ways to analyze a thematic map.

June Bugs• Lesson Scenario and Problem

– The purpose of this lesson is for students to understand how tabular data can be expressed in map form. This understanding is not intuitive and for students to use the unit lessons in this curriculum project, they must see how data lie behind maps and how cartographic manipulation allows a wide variety of different graphic images, or geographic patterns, from the same data source.

– Scenario: A group of students are spending their vacation at Dewey Beach, Delaware. Two of them become ill and need to find a doctor. They look in the phone book (Yellow Pages) and find a large number of doctors but none in Dewey Beach. They have to decide what type of doctor they need and where they should go.

June Bugs

1. Read – Looking for Summer Fun

June Bugs Step 1

• First, check the Yellow Pages and see if you can find the names of any doctors in Dewey Beach. If you cannot, then make a chart like the one below, listing the ten doctors you think will be most likely to help your fellow students, and give the reason why they were the doctors you chose.

June Bugs Step 1Doc Picks Why Chosen?

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June Bugs Step 2

• Now read "June Bugs: Looking for the Way"

• Consider the following question: – Which doctor would be your best choice? If

that doctor wasn't available, which one would be your next best choice? Explain.

– Put the full list of doctors in priority order and write in your notes what information you used to decide on the order

June Bugs Step 3

• Now examine a map of the Sussex County road system.

• On a copy of the map, locate the office of each doctor on your list and place a solid dot on the appropriate point on the map

June Bugs Step 3

• Now you are able to examine the problem of choosing a doctor geographically. This means you must look at the spatial (geographical) distribution of the dots and the relative location of Dewey Beach to the doctors.

• What other factors besides straight line-distance should you consider?

• What other information might you need? • Based on your analysis, compile a final list of

doctors that you should contact in priority order, and write the reasons for the order of your list in your notes.

June Bugs Step 4

• Review: – Read the information on mapping data

"FYI Mapping Data" – Make a list of data that CANNOT be mapped (i.e.

data that is non-geographical). – Now provide some examples of data that are more

meaningful (useful) when converted from non-geographical to a geographical, or mapped, format.

• What specific information is needed to turn each example into a map?

Exit Ticket

• Think of some non-geographical data that could be mapped relating to Glasgow High School.

• Create a plan in which you could collect that data and map it out.

Can We Get to a Doctor?

• Lesson Essential Question – – What geographic patterns emerge when you

map data? – What can analyzing the data tell about the

map?

• Vocabulary– Accessibility – Geographically

Can We Get to a Doctor?

• Geography High School Standard Benchmark Addressed– Standard One: MAPS. 9-12a. Students will identify

geographic patterns which emerge when data is mapped, and analyze mapped patterns…..

• Learning objectives– Learn how to organize data into categories and

then use those data to produce a thematic map. – Learn ways to analyze a thematic map using a

GIS.

Can We Get to a Doctor?

• Lesson Scenario and Problem– After completing Lesson I students should have a better idea of

some of the difficulties involved in getting to a doctor, especially if private auto transport is unavailable. Alex and Chris were surprised and wondered whether reaching a doctor varied across the whole of Sussex County. They decided to explore this question geographically, using a Geographic Information System (GIS) approach. Students take the role of Alex and Chris again and follow in their footsteps.

– This lesson introduces students to Geographic Information Systems analysis. It is not designed to teach students how to conduct GIS programming. Rather, the nature of a GIS is first introduced followed by a demonstration of how it can be used to analyze geographic patterns. This knowledge is a necessary part of all the unit lessons that follow.

Can We Get to a Doctor? Step 1

1. Cornell Notes – GIS Intro

Can We Get to a Doctor? Step 2

Take out the map of Sussex County you made of the location of the ten doctors in Lesson I. Then look at a larger list of doctors compiled from the Yellow Pages. This time the list contains just the doctors who practice family medicine or who are internists (doctors who deal with all aspects of the body). They are the doctors people are most likely to visit on a regular basis. Using this list, add dots for each doctor’s location to your map.

Can We Get to a Doctor? Step 2

• Examine the pattern of dots. – What can you conclude about the distribution

of doctors in Sussex County? – What additional information is needed to see

whether everyone in Sussex County has equal access to a doctor?

– Write a list in your notesof what other types of map layers you would like to see.

Can We Get to a Doctor Step 3

• One item on your list should be that you would like to know where people live in Sussex County. With that information, you can see whether more doctors are found where people live.

• You will find a blank outline map of Sussex County zip code areas and a list of the number of people in each zip code at the time of the 2000 Census. Notice that the data have been arranged from the largest to the smallest population. Divide the data into five groups and give each group a different color. Then color the corresponding zip code area.

Can We Get to a Doctor Step 3

• Now you have two map layers, one of doctors and one of population. Compare the two layers and you are doing GIS analysis. – Are doctors fairly distributed among the population so

that everyone has equal access to medical care? – Are there some areas that are better served than

others? Some areas that are not as well served? – Write your answers to these questions in your

research notebook.

Can We Get to a Doctor Step 4

• One of the advantages of using a GIS is the ability to measure the information being mapped because it is stored digitally. Let’s see how this might help our analysis. We have prepared another version of the maps you just made. This time, we have used our GIS to lay the distribution of doctors over the zip code areas of population, and we have classified the population into ten instead of just five categories.

• Review the responses you wrote in your notebook to the questions posed in step three above. Do you wish to change or enlarge on any observations you made?

Can We Get to a Doctor Step 4

• Now let’s explore another aspect of our analysis. – Who are the people in Sussex county who

have to travel the farthest to reach a doctor? – We can use the measuring ability of our GIS

to produce a map that shows how far each zip code area is away from a doctor

– Write your answer to this question in your research notebook.

Can We Get to a Doctor Step 5

• What would you like to know about the people who have better or worse ability to get to a doctor in the county?

• Make a list of the criteria you could use as the basis for another map layer.

Class Work

• Write a letter to the local newspaper, with your opinion of an article the newspaper published recently with the headline: “GETTING TO THE DOC. TOUGHER FOR THE POOR” Use the information you have gathered from your research to justify the position you take in your letter.

Exit Ticket

Who are the Planners?

Think/Pair/Share

• Do you like to plan ahead?

• What are some of the pros and cons of planning?

Citizen Planners

• All over the state, citizens contribute to comprehensive plans for the space where they live and work.

Planning a community that works for everyone involves

• Geographic knowledge and perspectives

• Skillful use of geographic tools

• Teamwork among citizens and with government groups

Geography and DOE

• This map of a part of Maryland shows how much water has been removed from an aquifer. Water levels measurements (also know as head measurements) are shown by the black contours and are critical when calculating water loss from an aquifer.

• In the area located near the red arrow you can see that the water levels have been measured at -80 feet below sea-level. The ‘bullseye’ you see is called a cone of depression and indicates a decline in water levels due to pumpage. You can see from the map that this decline covers a large area and has regional impacts.

• A regional planner could use this type of map to locate a new community or an industrial facility that uses lots of water. (such as a thermo electric plant or paper mill).

Geography and Transportation

Geography and Traffic Collisions•This map shows collisions that occurred within specific census areas within the City of Wilmington.

•The data was gathered with collaboration from the Wilmington Police Department, the Delaware State Police and a from the Department of Planning.

•This data will appear in the Area Community Notebook that is distributed annually by the city.

Class work

Home work

• Read – Student Reading Standard One

Exit Ticket