Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
(4) Survey of damage in historically fl ooded areas; (5) Students conduct fi eld
surveys at a time of heavy rain and fl ooding; (6) Combining and collating survey
reports, and identifying dangerous places; (7) Creating a fl ood hazard map; (8)
Performing a safety assessment of the school.
Class Evaluation and Development
The strong relationship between natural disasters
and landforms and climate characteristics in the local area become a context for
the project. In the project planning phase, students consider such questions as,
“What kinds of natural disasters should we be worried about at Chiba Nishi High
School?” By having students research their immediate surroundings, their desire for
learning is increased. To raise students' awareness of dangers and to foster their
ability to adapt to hazards, GIS and other means of three-dimensional expression
are effectively used to simulate disasters. Koseki (
2007
) found that students' explo-
ration of their local area and map construction based on data collection could be
linked with disaster education.
Developing Activities
Teachers at the school held a disaster prevention meeting that
had 26 attendees, including educators from the school (the principal, vice principal,
leading teaching staff, representatives from the students' association, and others),
the community (parents' association, alumni association, local assembly, and others),
and government (city offi ce, local police, and others). As a result, Koseki is confi dent
that they have realized several improvements, including the necessity for sharing
awareness of disaster prevention, reexamination of the disaster prevention manual
and evacuation drills, confi rmation of actors' roles, identifi cation of inadequate disas-
ter prevention facilities, issues over the use of maps, and the importance of having all
related actors and groups meet regularly to confer.
11.3.3
Classroom Realities and Ways to Improve Instruction
The National Institute for Educational Policy Research (
2003
) carried out a survey
entitled “Research on the Curriculum,” regarding the implementation status of
the educational process, asking questions about how the goals and content of each
subject specifi ed in the National Curriculum Standards were being implemented in
classrooms. The objective of the survey was to understand the actual learning situation
to improve the educational process and means of future instruction.
In 2003, a written questionnaire was administered to both students and teachers
about Social Studies and Geography learning in the fi fth grade of elementary school,
the fi rst and second grades of junior high school, and the third grade of senior high
school. Many r students in the lower grade answered that they liked Social Studies
and Geography and believed them to be important. However, this trend declined
with grade level increase (Table
11.2
). If we look at types of classes, more than half
of elementary school classes required schoolchildren to present information that
they looked up at the library, and to incorporate observations and survey fi ndings.
In junior high school, the proportion of students taking geography declined by
