Geography Curriculum Homeschool
Homeschool Geography is one of the core subjects we teach as a part of our homeschool social studies curriculum.
When many homeschoolers are selecting the resources they wish to use to support them to homeschool well, it is hard to walk past the Charlotte Mason method.
With Living Books, Nature Study and Nature Walks, beautiful notebooks, and art and music appreciation, there is a lot to love about this method, including the fact that Charlotte herself was a keen geographer and wrote books on geography too.
Just as history is more than memorising dates, homeschool geography should be far more than simply remembering capital cities and the names of rivers. Studying geography offers students the opportunity to view their world through a different lens and to appreciate the complexity of the world. Teaching a geography curriculum homeschool brings context by helping your children to better understand places and people. Including a strong geography program in your homeschool is a joy! It will engage and inspire your child to learn more about the world they live in but to also do this in a sophisticated way.
Gill Meller, the President of the Geographical Association (2019 – 2020) wrote:
There are so many ways in which geography is fundamental to our lives, from physical landscapes, natural disasters, the characteristics of where we live, the energy we use, services we enjoy, the travel we undertake and the networks in which we engage. Geography is a cornerstone in the continuing education of everyone, both young and old, helping to make us more effective local and global citizens.
Geography Knowledge Helps Us Understand Many Subjects
At present, many schools place a lot of emphasis on STEM yet seem to forget that it is geography that helps us to imagine and shape what the future might bring. It is geography that helps us to better understand key issues for our world today, such as:
- the changing nature of travel and commuting due to the COVID-19 pandemic;
- geopolitical tensions between nations and regions across the globe;
- concerns over rainforest clearing and the encroachment of urban areas into agricultural land; and
- bushfires and wildfires, floods, earthquakes, volcanoes and tsunamis.
Geography is a subject that spans across both the natural and social sciences and places students in an ideal situation to assess and address global issues.
Geography Homeschool Curriculum That Supports Parents
Yet, many homeschoolers struggle with how to teach these amazing and interesting topics in their homeschools when faced with geography resource choices that are boring and dull.
Many of the geography resources offered by My Homeschool have been prepared by a geographer specifically for the homeschool setting. Here at My Homeschool we see geography as a passport for your little scholars and we study this subject as a way to enable families to travel around the world. Through curated booklists, dynamic online resources, strong geography skills basis, and lesson plans, you too can teach geography with confidence and skill.
Learning Across The Geography Homeschool Curriculum
From our Geography Rambles in the first year of schooling to teach those key out-of-door geography skills that too many programs miss, to travelling through each and every continent, across both hemispheres, learning about key landscapes and landforms, and aspects of cultural and social geography, this is a subject that includes both natural and human-made environments. With the right resources, it will become a favourite subject. This is a subject that touches all aspects of human life and we all live geography everyday, so why not learn how you can teach it well in your homeschool?
Geography Prepares Our Children For The Future
Geography is a subject that is very much at the top of students choices at the moment. In 2019 the number of students taking GSCE geography was higher than it had been for nearly 20 years, making it the 6th most popular subject choice for students across England, Northern Ireland and Wales. When you remember that three of those subjects need to be the compulsory English, mathematics and science you understand just how popular geography is. Many students are considering geography as a degree for their future as they know how well it will equip them. As academic and social geographer Danny Dorling shared in an article for Geographical in 2020:
For the new generation of young people who are passionate about the planet, the degree choice is obvious: geography… You’re really allowed to do almost anything you like as a geographer – by combining this new enthusiasm with free thought, geography can truly push boundaries.
Want to push aside the tired and tedious geography resources you have and bring a new enthusiasm for this subject in your homeschool? Then please look at the My Homeschool graded courses and see how you too can teach geography with pizazz.
