An analysis on how students relate school geography to their living experience

Abstract

The Geographical Association Manifesto (2009) considers Living Geography as an approach to geography that makes it directly relevant to peoples’ lives since it brings out the present and real-world enquiry into the curriculum. It is now recognised that the role of the student’s personal geographies plays a considerable importance in school geography. So much so that this is reflected in the Curriculum Making Model, where the students experience is considered as one of the main pillars that the teacher has to balance together with the subject content and pedagogic choices to engage the students to think geographically. Yet Catling (2006) states that the students’ geographies are often unnoticed during the teaching-learning experience. Therefore, the objective of this research is to see if and how students relate school geography to their living experience and whether teachers make use of living geography in their pedagogy. This is obtained by interviewing geography teachers and geography Option students. The interviews is conducted to a range six geography teachers. The results show that the teachers do make use of living geography despite not knowing of this concept. These teachers often refer to the students’ personal experience. The students participating in this study explained that they refer to the knowledge gained through Geography as they feel it is a subject that helps them make sense of their own surroundings. Nevertheless, teachers and students face several hindrances that limit their possibility to relate further their living experiences not only to the explanation in class but to make the broader context through geographical thinking.