Why does your child need to study geography? The truth is, that geography can often be overlooked when planning a child’s education. Most often it is blended in here and there with other school topics.
What exactly is geography?
Geography is the study of the physical features of the heart and the behaviors of the people in each area. For these reasons and more, it really does deserve attention of its own or focus of its own when planning your child’s education.
6 Reasons to Why Your Child Needs to Study Geography
Your child needs to know where places are.
With the news full of information from around the world basic geography is vital to understanding where news reports are coming from and how they affect your child on a personal and world level. Knowing where places are and how to find new places on a map or globe can help your child understand what is happening to them as they get older.
Knowing how to read a map is a vital life skill
Sure we have GPS available to us now to make finding our way around easy but what happens when GPS goes down or the signal is poor. Teaching your child to read a map helps them understand how to find their way around even when GPS is not an option.
Geocaching is a great way to teach your children how to find their way around. The best part? It is done in a fun and active way which makes this vital geography skill easy to learn.
Understanding the earth and how it was formed and changes over time.
Through the study of geography, our children learn about landforms and plate tectonics. In order for them to understand how the land is changed and shaped over time, your child needs to understand what the basic landforms are and how they were formed.
This is a great opportunity to get hands-on with geography, using salt dough to make landforms and even demonstrate plates crashing together to form mountains is a great way to make it fun and exciting.
Geography can be taught in several ways from secular to faith-based making no reason for families to avoid this subject in their homeschool. You can find a great list of homeschool geography curriculum here.
Understanding basic earth systems
To understand how the earth works from weather to the flow of rivers you need to understand the geography that makes up the earth. Understanding geography makes it easier to understand why the desert does not get rain while the mountains next to it are covered in snow.
Connect to history in new ways.
From reading and comparing old maps to modern ones to learning about locations of major historical events, geography is an important part of your studies of history. Map work is a great way to help your child make connections to history bringing it to life.
Learn about the cultures of the world.
To understand others we need to take a look at where they are from and the culture they have grown up in. Exploring the work through studying cultures including traditions, music, and food allows your child to really get to understand others in a new and exciting way.
The world is full of new places to learn about and explore. Make it fun by choosing a location you are studying in history or grab a globe and choose a random place to study.
A couple of things I’ve always included as part of our geography studies are videos and food. Videos are great resources to use to bring a new place to life. Everyone loves food, so be sure to have your children try their hand at creating a recipe from the place you’re studying!
The world is so much bigger than right outside your front door. Bring it to life for your children through the study of geography consistently throughout their education. You never know where their future may take them!
You’ll find lots of fun ways to teach your children about geography by following our Pinterest board below.
Follow Misty Leask’s board Homeschool: Geography on Pinterest.
