| HGA | Standards | Grade 9-12 |
PLACES AND REGIONS
Geography Standard 4: The physical and human characteristics of places
By the end of the twelfth grade, the student knows and understands:
Therefore, the student is able to:
A. Explain place from a variety of points of view, as exemplified by being able to
Describe the same place ar different times in its history (e.g., London as a Roman outpost in Britain, as a medieval trading center, and as the seat of a global empire in the nineteenth century or Tokyo in the three decades immediately before and after the Meiji Restoration)
Explain why places have specific physical and human characteristics in different parts of the world (e.g., the effects of climatic and tectonic processes, settlement and migration patterns, site and situation components)
Develop a definition of place appropriate for inclusion in a glossary of geographic terms
B. Describe and interpret physical processes that shape places, as exemplified by being able to
Describe how forces from within Earth (e.g., tectonic processes such as volcanic activity and earthquakes) influence the character of place
Analyze the role of climate (e.g., the effects of temperature, precipitation, wind) in shaping places
Describe and interpret the importance of erosional processes in shaping places (e.g., the cliffs of Malibu or the sand dunes of Cape Cod)
C. Explain how social, cultural, and economic processes shape the features of places, as exemplified by being able to
Describe how culture (e.g., toponyms, food preferences, gender roles, resource use, belief systems, modes of transportation and communication) affects the characteristics of place
Identify how places have been altered by major technological changes (e.g., advances brought about by the agricultural and industrial revolutions, the invention of the automobile, the development of machinery for large-scale agriculture, the invention of the computer)
Analyze the ways in which the character of a place relates to its economic, political, and population characteristics (e.g., how a large state university influences the small town in which it is located or how the location of a regional medical center attracts senior citizens as residents)
D. Evaluate how humans interact with physical environments to form places, as exemplified by being able to
Identify the locational advantages and disadvantages of using places for different activities based on their physical characteristics (e.g., floodplain, forest, tundra, earthquake zone, river crossing, or coastal flood zone)
Explain how places are made distinctive and meaningful by human activities that alter physical features (e.g., the construction of the interstate highway system in the United States, the terracing of hillsides to grow rice in Thailand)
Evaluate the effects of population growth and urbanization on places (e.g., air pollution in Mexico City, Los Angeles, and Milan; the loss of farmlands to rapidly growing urban areas)
Geography Standard 5: The people create regions to interpret earths complexity
By the end of the twelfth grade, the student knows and understands:
Therefore, the student is able to:
A. List and explain the changing criteria that can be used to define a region, as exemplified by being able to Identify the physical or human factors that constitute a region (e.g., soils, climate, and vegetation have created the fertile triangle in Russia; common language, religion, and history have established Portugal as a region
Explain how changing conditions can result in a region taking on a new structure (e.g., the reshaping of Miami and south Florida resulting from the influx of people and capital from some areas of the Caribbean Basin, or the reshaping of southern Africa resulting from the economic and political realignments that followed the end of European colonialism)
Explain why regions once characterized by one set of criteria may be defined by a different set of criteria today (e.g., the Caribbean Basins transition from a major sugarcane and hemp producer to a center for tourism, New Englands gradual conversion from a region of small textile mills and shoe factories in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries to one of high-technology industries in the 1980s and 1990s)
B. Describe the types and organization of regional systems, as exemplified by being able to
Identify the differences among formal, functional, and perceptual regions (e.g., a formal region with some homogeneous characteristic in common, such as a desert climate; a functional region marked by its interdependent parts, such as the structure of the Federal Reserve banking system in the United States; or a perceptual region as a commonly understood conceptual construct such as Dixie or the rust belt)
Explain how functional regions are held together (e.g., by nodal centers such as a neighborhood coffee shop, city hall, or suburban shopping mall)
Identify the ways in which the concept of a region can be used to simplify the complexity of Earths space (e.g., by arranging an area into sections to help understand a particular topic or problem)
C. Identify human and physical changes in regions and explain the factors that contribute to those changes, as exemplified by being able to
Use maps to illustrate how regional boundaries change (e.g., changes resulting from shifts in population, environmental degradation, or shifts in production and market patterns)
Identify some of the reasons for changes in the worlds political boundaries (e.g., the frequently changing political boundaries of Poland over the centuries owing to Poland being partitioned by stronger neighbors, the creation of landlocked states such as Bolivia as a result of wars, or territorial issues resulting from disputes about access to resources)
Explain factors that contribute to the dynamic nature of regions (e.g., human influences such as migration, technology, and capital investment; physical influences such as long-term climate shifts and seismic activity)
Geography Standard 6: How culture and experience influence peoples perceptions of places and regions
By the end of the twelfth grade, the student knows and understands:
Therefore, the student is able to:
A. Explain why places and regions are important to individual human identity and as symbols for unifying or fragmenting society, as exemplified by being able to
Interpret how people express attachment to places and regions (e.g., by reference to essays, novels, poems, and short stories, feature films, or such traditional musical compositions as God Bless America and America the Beautiful)
Explain how point of view influences a persons perception of place (e.g., how various ethnic groups have a point of view about what constitutes an ideal residential landsacpe, how an environmentalist and real estate developer would be likely to differ on the best use for a barrier island)
Identify how places take on symbolic meaning (e.g., Jerusalem as a holy city for Muslims, Christians, and Jews; Arlington National Cemetery and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier as places to honor the war dead of the United States)
B. Explain how individuals view places and regions on the basis of their stage of life, sex, social class, ethnicity, values, and belief systems, as exemplified by being able to
Make inferences about differences in the personal geographies of men and women (e.g., perceptions of distance, impressions about what makes a place secure, or how space can be organized)
Speculate on how the socioeconomic backgrounds of people influence their points of view about a place or a region (e.g., their views of public housing, wealthy urban neighborhoods, or busy commercial strips along an arterial street)
Explain how places and regions are stereotyped (e.g., how the West became wild or how all of Appalachia is associated with poverty)
C. Analyze the ways in which peoples changing views of places and regions reflect cultural change, as exemplified by being able to
Explain how shifts from a predominantly rural to a predominantly urban society influences the ways in which people perceive an environment (e.g., rural settings becoming attractive as recreation areas to people living in densely populated cities, old mining ghost towns becoming tourist and gambling centers)
Explain how increases in income, longer life expectancy, and attitudes toward aging influence where people choose to live (e.g., retirement communities in Florida and Arizona)
Examine the sequential occupance of a specific habitat (e.g., the impact of settlement on an Arctic archipelago by: indigenous peoples; a group of nineteenth century shipborne explorers; subsequent settlers from abroad who came to hunt, fish, and trade; seasonal whalers and fishermen; and geologists searching for petroleum reserves in the area)