Report in today's Daily Mail . You carefully sort out your recycling every week and put it in a separate bin... But is it always actually recycled ?
Posts
There has been plenty of relevant news over the last few weeks to keep us all up to date with new case study material. Crime maps published by the Metropolitan Police and other police areas The arrival of Hurricane Gustav and evacuation of New Orleans Thanks to Alix on SLN for tip-off to excellent article in The Guardian on the CHAR dwellers of Bangladesh. The Jamuna river is often called the "Jamuna braid". It is 22km at its widest point and it splits into estuaries and channels, diverging and reconnecting to create a shifting landscape that is part land, part water. It is in the Jamuna braid that most of Bangladesh's chars are located. The chars - islands made of river silt - are strange land formations that inhabit the space between land and water. Every year in Bangladesh, new chars emerge out of the river's changing course; and as they appear, old ones are returned to the water, swallowed by the river as though it is collecting on an old debt. The story of thes...
Couple of new things from today... First of all a book that might be of use for those geographers who have issues with the use of statistics. "The Tiger that Isn't" explores issues such as correlation which always get people a little confused... I have discovered a range of articles written by one of the authors: Michael Blastland, on the BBC's MAGAZINE section. This is an excellent introduction to the content of the book. Check out the 5 articles, which are on the following themes: CAUSATION AVERAGES PERCENTAGES COUNTING SURVEYS All have their relevance for geographical enquiries. Check out the comments section too - for example, there's a mention of one of my favourite statistical 'connections': between babies and storks. Earlier, visited the site of NEAD: Norfolk Education and Action for Development . Involved in a conference with NEAD in October, and was checking some links. Came across a link to a useful sounding document. It's produced by DEA ...
Check out John Davitt's NEW TOOLS blog for some interesting teaching and learning ideas. One that I particularly like is his LEARNING EVENT GENERATOR . Click to get an instant idea for how to deliver a particular topic. An editable version is available if you e-mail John... Update Thanks to John for getting in touch and offering to make me a special Geography event generator. Just doing some GOOGLE DOCS files for that... Watch this space (not this exact one...)
Innovative Geography Teaching Grant (RGS-IBG) You have until the 19th of October to put your entry in for one of these grants. Competition has got a bit stronger than when I first entered. The word INNOVATIVE puts a lot of people off, but we all have the potential to be innovative: all of us have a 'great' idea from time to time (I have them all the time of course...) Have some conviction that your idea could be developed with a bit of funding to support other geographers. If you want inspiration, there is now a PDF FILE with details of previous recipients to download. There are some familiar names on there... For example, look at this entry from 2003 Year: 2003 Project Leader: Alan Parkinson Schools: King Edward VII School, Kings Lynn Project Title: Geo Blogs Abstract: ‘Geo Blogs’ created a web page aimed to encourage students to post their own Geographical ‘blogs’ on current and daily events, encouraging the students to investigate how everyday activities and observations ...
Image of Murmansk by Flickr user Christian Toennesen, made available under Creative Commons. Just caught up with a journal called MONOCLE , which has 5 strands: one of which is CULTURE. They also have an excellent REPORTAGE section, and have just watched a short video on YUBARI : a Japanese ghost town, which lost its coalmine - the major sourcce of employment (videos can also be downloaded in mp4 format) There's plenty of other thought-provoking content here... Check out the report on the fluctuating fortunes of MURMANSK. Many Russian cities might seem like they are at the end of the world, but Murmansk really is. Following the break-up of the USSR, the city and its naval base went into decline, but the riches offered by its Arctic location are now promising a revival
A few new things... Site called GEOGRAPHYONTHEMAP appeared. Some resources to download that might be of use to people. Slideshare presentation on the WORLD's HAPPIEST PLACES TO LIVE The Worlds Happiest Places To Live View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: businessweek causerelatedmarketing ) And another one here on MAPMAKERS by 'Jonesy2008' - very nice choice of images. Map Makers! View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: geography: map )
Finally got my hands on my Elonex ONEt mini computer. It's a neat little unit, and connected to my WiFi straightaway. Also has a range of useful software and is certainly portable: one to use on the train.... Will let you know how I get on with it. Below is an image with my 17" flatscreen and a pen for scale comparison...
No Nano There is currently a dispute over land near the factory that produces the world's cheapest car, which has halted production. The TATA NANO website has information on the car: "the people's car", that offers the chance of car ownership to an Indian population whose wealth is increasing (although as always, not everyone is sharing in the economic growth...)
Free GIS course at the RGS GIS made easy – 17 October at 9.50am A free one day symposium to include presentations by the OS and the RGS-IBG Education Department. Workshops led by the leading providers of GIS software and demonstrations of the free support, guidance and resources available online. Registration is free but advanced booking is required. http://www.rgs.org/gis educations@rgs.org
So that was the summer... From tomorrow, I will be concentrating my blogging in a number of areas: a) LIVING GEOGRAPHY : day to day life as Secondary Curriculum Development Leader of the Geographical Association b) GEOGRAPHY AND ALL THAT JAZZ (here): general geography stories, and all that jazz... c) CULTCHA : the Cultural Geography blog (in preparation for SAGT 2008) Keep reading !
Do you use films in your geography teaching ? If so, Chris Lloyd Staples would like to hear from you for a session she's running at this year's SAGT CONFERENCE. She has set up a SURVEY MONKEY survey where you can enter details of your TOP 10 (or numbers less than that) of films that you use in the classroom... Speaking of which, Tony Cassidy has been at his "film poster subversion" again... Just filled in the survey myself and I mentioned a few films that I use bits of.
If it's Thursday then it must be time for another list of the things that are typically British (or in this case, what makes Britain Great) This time it's linked to a book by a writer called Ian Aitch (I have his earlier book about English summer called "A Fete worse than death" - a phrase I like to use whenever I come across a fete... which is not often to be fair...) The book is published next week, and is available from Amazon : called "We're British, Innit" There is an article and associated extensive photo gallery (with brief captions) here, thanks to the Independent. Would be good for Pilot GCSE "My Place" and "Cultural Geography" with reference to Britishness...
Have been enjoying reading this story about Eve Stuart-Kelso and her missing garden gnome: Murphy. He disappeared for 7 months, and was then returned complete with a photo album showing him having global adventures as far away as New Zealand. How about doing this with your own gnome ? With Smartboard 10 software you can cut out a gnome from an image (below is one I made earlier, with thanks to Flickr user Mr. Moor for the excellent gnome !), and then superimpose it on another image or location.... e.g. Here is a gnome with me and a Superlambanana in Liverpool !
Crime Mapping The police have always used geographical information in their fight against crime. Certain patterns of behaviour can be mapped. Do crime maps help ? The Government plans to produce neighbourhood crime maps for everyone "by the end of 2008". This will enable people to assess their own neighbourhood. Yesterday's CRIME HOTSPOTS programme on Radio 4, which can be listened to again via the LISTEN AGAIN feature demonstrated once again the value of GIS, and geo-spatial investigation. This moves beyond the old drawing pin on the map. It outlines the behaviours of criminals in relation to their own home area. There is also the tactic of geographic profiling. The WEST MIDLANDS area already has a GIS in operation, which allows interrogation of crime figures and trends. Those living in the METROPOLITAN POLICE area also have access to crime mapping. Will Crime maps work ? - BBC News magazine feature Interestingly putting the terms" crime geography " into...