Teaching English and Geography simultaneously using mapsIntroduction:
The student in the low income EFL context, in addition to having limited access to English also has quiet a restricted exposure to World Geography and foreign cultures. This exercise has proven to strengthen basic grammatical skills in addition to being an eye opening experience to the world as students make sentences using specific grammar areas about the location of countries. The context stimulates a context for foreign language usage and learning about foreign places. Moreover, costs the lesson materials are minimal.
Objective:
To integrate basic World Geography in the English classroom and develop conversational skills.
Level: Middle and High School
Language Context: EFL
Procedure: Students will bring or be provided with world maps. They will be exposed to the grammar skill and then the teacher will provide examples of the skill using a world map. For example if the topic is prepositions, the teacher will pick two adjacent countries on the map and make a sentence about them such as “ Colombia is next to Venezuela” Other similar sentences would be provided to the students in order to introduce other prepositions using the same geographical context. Likewise, topics such as comparatives, superlatives could also be taught. Both language and geography or content skills can be gradually scaled up through longer sentences and increasing the amount of geographical features to be identified on maps.
A meaningful learning context is established when both students and teachers begin to identify their birth places or country of origin on the map.
