;eOrdinary Homeschooler
Dr. Mary Hood
Geography, World Missions,
& Comparative Religion
Whenever you are deci- ding how to approach an area of study, it helps to think through your goals.
When teaching geography, my own goals
have very little to do with memorizing the
names of countries and what they import
or export. For me, it all begins with helping
children develop a sense of adventure.
;e best study of
geography and history
always comes from
;rsthand experiences.
hard in the middle of the night and never
even made it through the screened top of
our tent!
In Arizona, I marveled at the way you
could see three entire trains in one vista.
In Georgia, you can see only about twenty cars at a time, since the mountains and
bends in the tracks block the view. As we
passed through the Sierra Nevadas, we
thought of the story ;e Incredible Journey, where the dogs and the cat struggled
to make it through the mountains back
to civilization. On reaching the Paci;c
Ocean, coming down through Topanga
Canyon toward the beach at Malibu, we
talked about the Lewis and Clark expedition and marveled at our ;rst look at the
Paci;c Ocean.
Even in your own little area of the
world, there are plenty of places to go.
;e best study of geography and his-
tory always comes from ;rsthand ex-
periences. ;e second best, of course,
is through vicarious experiences, such
as travel videos, good books, and biog-
raphies of people from other times and
other lands.
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