This lesson will provide students with an opportunity to learn about the importance and fluidity of certain types of boundaries from pre-colonial Asia to the present. Students will use a wide variety of maps, satellite photos, and texts (descriptive/historical/political) to understand and visualize the evolution of physical and political boundaries. Students will compare and contrast boundaries from different time periods in order to understand the influence of geology/physical geography and politics/history on the evolution of the nation state and its impact on human society and culture.

This lesson is one in a series developed in collaboration with The Asia Society, with support from the Freeman Foundation, highlighting the geography and culture of Asia and its people.

Geography, geology, history, and social studies

Standard 5: "That people create regions to interpret Earth's complexities"
Standard 6: "How culture and experience influence people's perceptions of places and regions"
Standard 12: "The processes, patterns, and functions of human settlement"

Two to three hours

• Computer with Internet access
• Variety of historical maps of Asia, including those which depict geologic forces that formed Asia, political boundaries, languages, belief systems and commercial activity

Students will

• demonstrate an understanding of the geological time and forces that were necessary to create the continent of Asia;
• describe Asia's geography and geologic formations that have been used as boundaries;
• describe the evolution of political boundaries in Asia;
• describe the impact of physical and political boundaries on the spread and/or isolation of people, culture, religion, commerce, and ideology; and
• analyze complex maps, satellite photos, and resources that describe the impact of geology, geography, politics, and history on Asia.

Open the lesson by asking students to draw, from memory, an outline map of Asia. Ask students to:

• label the continent's most distinct geologic and/or geographic features;
• identify features or formations that might act as boundaries;
• describe how those boundaries might impact people, culture, language, religion, commerce, and the flow of political ideology; and
• draw contemporary political boundaries on their maps (from memory).

Commence a whole-class discussion to answer the following questions:

• What are boundaries?
• How do they work?
• What is their role?
• Are some boundaries more permanent or temporary than others?
• Are some boundaries more impenetrable, permeable, or porous than others?
• Do Asia's contemporary physical features/formations act as boundaries in the 21st century?
• Are there any correlations between Asia's contemporary physical and political boundaries? Why or why not?
• Of what importance are boundaries in the modern world?
• Are boundaries more or less important than they might have been in pre-colonial Asia or at any point during its last 500 years?

Explain to students that they will be taking a critical look at a physical map of Asia to help them develop a sense of geologic time that will assist in their understanding of how the continent's most notable and prominent features came into existence. Have students access an online physical map of Asia. Tell them to identify the geographic features on the map (such as mountains, deserts, river systems, plains, plateaus, seas, etc.). Then tell them to think about the role these geographic features might have played as boundaries between people, nations, cultures, languages, commerce, religion, and ideology.

Next, have students access historical maps, satellite photos, and online resources (see the Related Links section of this lesson) that depict Asia from pre-colonial times to the present.

Introduce students to the National Geographic MapMachine Student Edition interactive atlas. On the atlas, explore the thematic maps of:

• Food and agriculture
• History
• Language
• Natural world
• Peoples and cultures
• Religion

Divide students into six groups. Assign each group one of the thematic maps listed above. Explain to the students that they will work together to gain additional insight into the roles that physical and political boundaries have and continue to play in Asia. Have each group prepare a brief presentation answering the following question: How have changing boundaries affected _______________ in Asia?" filling their thematic topic into the blank.

Before they conduct their in-depth study of the topic, they should list "20 questions that someone studying the topic might ask. For example, students studying "How boundaries have affected food and agriculture in Asia" may include "Did/do long trade routes over mountains affect the trade of fresh produce?" as a guiding question.

Using these resource clusters, students should continue to develop "big questions" that will guide their research, analysis and learning, and presentation. The following are some learning goals that teachers can use to assist students in developing their 20 questions:

• Students in the food and agriculture cluster will learn about how different environments support life and propel trade and interactions of people throughout Asia and beyond. Students will analyze food production and supply from pre-colonial times to the present. What are the origins of commercial trade between and among Asian nations? At what point did Asian nations begin to trade with other regions of the world? What products were traded? How did physical and political boundaries impact commercial activity between regions, empires, dynasties, nations, and the international community? Which physical boundaries enhanced and impeded commercial activity in Asia? How did the establishment of political borders impact commercial activity?
• Students in the history cluster will learn about the rise, spread, acceptance, and/or demise of certain lifestyle and political ideologies across the Asian continent. Students should try to ascertain whether physical and/or political boundaries have aided or hindered people and nations. Why did some nations flourish while others vanished? Considering what you know about physical and political boundaries in Asia, what role may they have played in the origin, importation, and implementation of political ideologies in Asia?
• Students in the language cluster will learn about the origins, dissemination, and relationships that exist between Asian languages. Additionally students will explore the historical antecedents that influenced the development of language families prior to and following the establishment of colonialism toward the end of the 15th century. Where did Asian languages originate? When and how did distinct languages evolve in Asia? To what degree, if any, are Asian languages related to one another? Have physical and/or political boundaries helped shape the evolution and relationships that exist among and between Asian languages?
• Students in the natural world cluster can speculate on how the natural world affects human lifestyles over time and how humans have changed the natural world. How should humans balance preservation of the natural world versus development to ensure adequate standards of living for citizens? What are some case studies that support different sides of this argument? What types of boundaries, physical or otherwise, limit human development of the natural world?
• Students in the peoples and cultures cluster will find evidence of the peopling of Asia from pre-colonial times to the present. Who populated Asia? What relationships exist between the people populating Asia? What role did physical and political boundaries play in the way people and ethnic groups populated and came to live in certain parts of Asia? How have physical and political boundaries helped contain or spread culture in Asia? Have the boundaries prevented or aided the spread of culture in Asia?
• Students in the religion cluster will learn about the spread of and origins of indigenous religions in Asia. What religions have gained popularity in Asia from historical times to the present? Which religions have failed to gain regional and/or widespread followings in Asia? To what extent have physical and political boundaries played in the success or failure of religions (e.g. Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, etc.) in Asia?

Ultimately, students should be expected to create a final exhibition of knowledge that presents the "big questions" that have guided their research and analysis; reflections and results of their work with maps, photos, text, and data sets; and thorough appraisal and assessment of the role that physical and political borders have played in Asian history from pre-colonial times to the present.

Although students will have an opportunity to work with resources that cover an array of topics, they should have an opportunity to concentrate their remarks on a limited number of subjects so as to demonstrate their mastery of knowledge, understanding, and higher-level thinking as they pertain to the study of boundaries in Asia.

Have student groups share their 20 question presentations. Students should be encouraged to ask questions during the presentations to stimulate discussion about how the issues are interrelated.

Although assessment of student performance should be a constant, special emphasis might be given to the research and presentation phases of this project. Students could be asked for tangible evidence of their work during the research phase and then be monitored for observable evidence during the presentation. Finally, students could be required to demonstrate their understanding and mastery of changing physical and political boundaries by applying what they have learned to a new case study with authentic ties to a non-Asian region of the world.

As a means of making the lesson timelier, students could be asked to find examples of changing physical and political boundaries in current newspapers, magazines, or television, radio, and online resources. Examples could become the focus of a wall display, Web page, or brief presentations.

Asia Society's Ask Asia
National Geographic: MapMachine Student Edition
National Geographic: MapMachine—Physical Map: Asia
National Geographic: MapMachine—Satellilte Map: Asia
National Geographic: Xpeditions Atlas—Asia
University of Texas at Austin: Historical Maps of Asia