Cross Curricular Geography

 

Until this point in my graduate study of education, I never associated the study of geography with social studies. Rather, I regarded it as a separate discipline. Not only have I learned it’s true place in academics but I have come up with excellent cross curricular methods of teaching geography. As an aviation historian, I have studied in great detail the navigation methods of WWII pilots over both land and sea. One afternoon, I found myself studying the methods of teaching geography as a graduate student and a neuron fired a lesson plan which I will elaborate on in this blog.

The story begins with a lecture I gave at the Cornwall Public Library about the battle of Midway. I was curious about how the naval aviators found their way navigating a battle field that consisted of nothing but wide-open ocean. In my study, I discovered how they used navigation by radio, the position of the sun, waypoints and something else called dead reckoning. Dead reckoning is easily the most complicated and sophisticated method of navigation. It requires calculation of wind speed, course plus the aid of waypoints. It requires a lot of skills and training because with dead reckoning, a small error could cost the entire bombing mission. Navigators had to be trained in calculating the time delay and drift caused by a cross-wind to keep the aircraft on course. Other bomber pilots used tools called sextants and used the position of the sun to determine their location.

So, what does all this history have to do with the perfect geography lesson? Well, the answer is using this history to build a simulation lesson. This would be a cross-curricular lesson between history and geography where the teacher would create a target destination for a simulated WWII bombing mission. The students would learn only the basic concepts of dead reckoning to find their way to the target on a map. The teacher would provide the situation indicating head-winds or cross-winds, the location of the target and so on. An enthusiastic instructor could dress up the lesson with historical photographs and displaying maps on the smart-board. A teacher could even take this lesson one step further and mold it into a cooperative lesson. The instructor could divide the class into small groups, each group would represent a bomber crew, and t he students within each group would split the responsibilities of navigating to the target. This lesson would incorporate all aspects of geography and since it is an interactive lesson with complex and tasks requiring lots of thought, I believe it would be a home run for any social studies teacher.