(after pp. 42-44, Geography for Life: National
Geography Standards 1994)
1. Asking Geographic Questions
Successful geographic inquiry involves the ability and willingness to ask, speculate on, and answer questions about why things are where they are and how they got there. Geographers need to be able to pose questions about their surroundings: Where is something located? Why is it there? With what is it associated? What are the consequences of its location and associations? What is this place like?
We should speculate about possible answers to questions because speculation leads to the development of hypotheses that link the asking and answering stages of the process. Hypotheses guide the search for information.
2. Acquiring Geographic Information
Geographic information is information about locations, the physical and human characteristics of those locations, and the geographic activities and conditions of the people who live in those places. To answer geographic questions, we should start by gathering information from a variety of sources in a variety of ways. We should read and interpret all kinds of maps; compile and use primary and secondary information to prepare quantitative and qualitative descriptions; and collect data from interviews, fieldwork, reference material, and library research.
The skills involved in acquiring geographic information include locating and collecting data, observing and systematically recording information, reading and interpreting maps and other graphic representations of spaces and places, interviewing, and using statistical methods.
Primary sources of information, especially the result of fieldwork, are important in geographic inquiry. Fieldwork involves conducting research in the community by distributing questionnaires, taking photographs, recording observations, interviewing citizens, and collecting samples. Fieldwork helps arouse the curiosity and makes the study of geography more enjoyable and relevant. It fosters active learning by enabling us to observe, ask questions, identify problems, and hone perceptions of physical features and human activities.
Often we can obtain useful information from nonprimary sources. Secondary sources of information include texts, maps, statistics, photographs, multimedia, computer databases, newspapers, telephone directories, and government publications. Tertiary sources such as encyclopedias report information compiled from secondary sources and are important in some research situations.
3. Organizing Geographic Information
Once collected, the geographic information requires organization and display in ways that help analysis and interpretation. Arrange the data systematically. Separate and clarify in visual, graphic forms: photographs, aerial photos, graphs, cross sections, climagraphs, diagrams, tables, cartograms, and maps. Organize information from documents or interviews into pertinent quotes or tabular form.
There are many ways to organize geographic information. Maps play a central role in geographic inquiry, but there are other ways to translate data into visual form, such as by using graphs of all kinds, tables, spreadsheets, and time lines. Such visuals are especially useful when accompanied by clear oral or written summaries. Creativity and skill are necessary to arrange geographic information effectively. Decisions about design, color, graphics, scale, and clarity are important in developing the kinds of maps, graphs, and charts that best reflect the data.
Someone referred to geography as "the art of the mappable." Making maps is a common activity for geographers. We read (decode) maps to collect information and analyze geographic patterns and make (encode) maps to organize information. Making maps can mean using sketch maps to illustrate a point in an essay or to record field observations. It can mean using symbols to map data on the location of world resources or producing a county-level map of income in a state. It can even mean mapping the distribution of fire-ant mounds in a field or trash on a school quadrangle. For geographers, making maps should become as common, natural, and easy as writing a paragraph. We should be skilled in interpreting and creating map symbols, finding locations on maps using a variety of reference systems, orienting maps and finding directions, using scales to determine distance, and thinking critically about information on maps.
4. Analyzing Geographic Information
Analyzing geographic information involves seeking patterns, relationships, and connections. As we analyze and interpret information, meaningful patterns or processes emerge. We then synthesize observations into a coherent explanation, noting associations and similarities between areas; recognizing patterns; and drawing inferences from maps, graphs, diagrams, tables, and other sources. Using statistics we can identify trends, relationships, and sequences.
Geographic analysis involves a variety of activities. It is sometimes difficult to separate the processes involved in organizing geographic information from the procedures used in analyzing it. The two processes go on simultaneously in many cases. But in other instances, analysis follows the manipulation of raw data into an easily understood and usable form. We need to scrutinize maps to discover and compare spatial patterns and relationships; study tables and graphs to determine trends and relationships between and among items; probe data through statistical methods to identify trends, sequences, correlations, and relationships; examine texts and documents to interpret, explain, and synthesize characteristics. Together these analytic processes lead to answers to the questions that first prompted an inquiry and to the development of geographic models and generalizations. These are the analytical skills that all of us need to develop.
5. Answering Geographic Questions
Successful geographic inquiry culminates in the development of generalizations and conclusions based on the data collected, organized, and analyzed. Skills associated with answering geographic questions include the ability to make inferences based on information organized in graphic form (maps, tables, graphs) and in oral and written narratives. These skills involve the ability to distinguish generalizations that apply at the local level from those that apply at the global level (issues of scale are important in developing answers to geographic questions).
Generalizations are the culmination of the process of inquiry, and they help to codify understanding. Developing generalizations requires that we use the information we have collected, processed, and analyzed to make general statements about geography. At other times, however, we use the evidence to make decisions; solve problems; or form judgments about a question, issue, or problem.
Geographic generalizations result from inductive reasoning or deductive reasoning. Inductive reasoning requires us to synthesize geographic information in order to answer questions and reach conclusions. Deductive reasoning requires us to identify relevant questions, collect and assess evidence, and decide whether the generalizations are appropriate by testing them against the real world.
Geographers should also be able to communicate clearly and effectively, especially as we learn to answer geographic questions. It is a skill linked closely to good citizenship. We can develop a sense of civic responsibility by disseminating the answers we have discovered in geographic inquiry. We can display geographic information in many engaging and effective ways--for example, by using multimedia, such as combinations of pictures, maps, graphs, and narratives, to present a story or illuminate a generalization. Geographic information can also reach the public eye through the use of poems, collages, plays, journals, and essays. Every medium chosen to present geographic information to answer a question or address an issue or problem should stimulate inquiry and communicate clearly. Choosing the best means of presenting answers to geographic questions is an important skill.
This fifth skill set represents the last step in the process of geographic inquiry. But it is not really the end, because the process usually begins again with new questions suggested by the conclusions and generalizations that have developed. These questions, often posed as hypotheses to be tested, provide a way to review generalizations. Each question answered, decision reached, or problem solved leads to new issues and new problems. Geographic learning is a continuous process that is both empowering and fascinating.
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Created 10 August 1998. Last revision occurred 14 August 2006.