WHAT’S YOUR REGION REALLY LIKE?
Return to 5-8 Table of Contents page
Introduction
How many different regions of your country can your students name? The concept of region is a useful tool in organizing geographic knowledge. A region is an area with common characteristics or features that give it cohesiveness and that set it apart from surrounding areas.
Regions aren’t cut-and-dried. A place may fall into one region based on a physical criterion—rainfall, for example—and into another based on a cultural criterion—such as dialect. New England, French-speaking Canada, and Islamic Africa are examples of cultural regions.
Teaching Level: Grades 5-8
Geography Standards
4. The physical and human characteristics of places
5. That people create regions to interpret earth’s complexity
6. How culture and experience influence people’s perception of places and regions
Geography Themes: Location, Place, Regions
Materials
Shoe box
Map of North America
Procedure
Post the map of North America, and ask a student to mark your location with a pushpin. Ask the students if they can name some regions in the U.S. (e.g., the Corn Belt, Silicon Valley, the Prairie Provinces, the South). Help the class delineate a few regions on the map, then discuss what criteria link the places within any one of those regions. Can students explain the concept of region? Of what region is your location a part? What are the characteristics of your region? Can the students think of criteria by which your location fits into more than one region?
Brainstorm with the students and list on the board as many cultural and physical characteristics of your region as you can. For example, for the Pacific Northwest: northwest corner of the contiguous United States; mountainous; rainy; coastal; healthy lifestyle; grunge rock; logging; major corporations, e.g., Boeing, Microsoft, Nike; salmon; orcas; Mount St. Helens; the Space Needle; totem poles; electric-colored outdoor gear; the Bonneville Dam; espresso; the SuperSonics and Trail Blazers basketball teams.
To make the concept of region less abstract, have the class make a culture capsule that represents your region today. Set out a shoe box or two for the collection of items that represent your region. Discuss what sorts of small items might qualify and ask students to bring in things from home. In the case of the Pacific Northwest, these items might be appropriate: ash from Mount St. Helens; a toy airplane; salmon fishing gear; a Pearl Jam CD; a ski pin; a miniature umbrella; a small bundle of wood; a computer disk. The class should decide as a group which items are to be placed in the box. Label the box and display it in the classroom.
Extension
Divide students into groups, and ask each group to make a list of items for a culture capsule to represent a region elsewhere in the country. When the groups are satisfied with their capsule lists, they can pass them on to each other and take turns figuring out which regions the lists represent.
From the 1995 Geography Awareness Week Teacher’s Handbook, National Geographic Society, 1995.
| 
