World Geography for the Curious: Teacher's Guide & Full Course Syllabus

This resource includes a digital download of the course syllabus & teacher's guide (PPTs can be purchased separately or in the BUNDLE) aimed at enriching your learner’s understanding of World Geography from the text: World Geography by McDougal Little (Houghton Mifflin) Student Edition- ISBN 0618689982 or hard copy- ISBN 10- 0547034741 ISBN 13: 9780547034744, the text is advertised as a HS reading level, but can be easily adapted for use.

Designed for educators- private and public, I provide supplemental videos, connect and apply discussion/ assignments, enrichment activity links and Kahoot games are included for a more wholistic approach to learning about the physical and human geography of each region. Additional literature of historical fiction, classics and biographies are given as individual reading or family read aloud suggestions and supplemental activity ideas are included for your reference and use as well.

The accompanying course PPTs are available as digital downloads/ resources for separate purchase or in bundle form.

Topics of Discussion Include:

Week One: Themes& Tools of Geography, Relative vs. Absolute Location; Satellite Imagery Surveying; Types of Maps

Week Two: Solar System; Pangea; Inner Earth: Core, Mantle, Crust; Atmosphere, Lithosphere, Hydrosphere, Biosphere; Landforms; Hydrologic Cycle; Hotspots, Plate Tectonics: Divergent, Subduction, Convergent, Transformative; Seismographs, Richter Scale, Epicenter; Mechanical and Chemical Weathering; Erosion: Water, Wind & Glacial

Week Three: Hemispheres, Solstice, Equinox; Weather vs. Climate; Precipitation: Frontal, Orographic, Convectional; Climate Factors: Wind & Ocean Currents, Latitude, Altitude; World Climates; Factors to Climate Change; Ecosystems, Biomes

Week Four: Innovation, Diffusion, Acculturation, Language Families, World Religions; Dynamic Populations; Forms of Government; Political Systems; United Nations

Week Five: Urban Land Planning: urbanization, megalopolis, CBD; Types of Production; Opportunity Cost, Specialization of Labor; Levels of Economic Opportunity; Natural Resources: Renewable/ Nonrenewable; Infrastructure

Week Six: Rocky Mountains, Appalachians, Great Plains; Continental Divide; St. Lawrence Seaway, Intercoastal Waterway, Lock Systems; Tornado Alley; Oregon & Santa Fe Trails; Transcontinental Railroad

Week Seven: American Colonization: Early Settlements, Columbian Exchange; Wars: French/ Indian, Revolutionary, Civil; Lands: 13 Colonies, Louisiana Purchase, Western Expansion; Agrarian, Industrialization, Information Ages; Democratic Republic, Free Market Economy; Subregions: New England, South, Midwest, West

Week Eight: Inuit, Vikings; Hudson Bay Company; Dominion of Canada, Provinces, Parliamentary Government; Yukon Gold Rush; Primary Economic Industries: Services, Manufacturing, Agriculture; NAFTA, Tariffs, Imports, Exports; 50th Parallel, Totems; Subregions: Atlantic, Core, Prairie, Pacific and Territories

Week Nine: Terrorism: 9/11; Urban Sprawl; Immigration: Melting Pot, Cultural Diversity; Depletion of Resources: Aquifers

Week Ten: New Spain; Simon Bolivar; Andes Mountains, Amazon River; Llanos, Cerrado, and Pampas; Caribbean: Bahamas, Lesser & Greater Antilles; Medicinal Plants of the Rainforest; Climate Zones of S. America; Slash & Burn Agriculture, Terracing; Urbanization & Tourism

Week Eleven: Political History: Revolutions & Governments; Panama Canal; NAFTA: Mayan, Spanish Mission, African, Inca Heritage; Reggae, Calypso, Samba, Capoeira; Mercosur Trade Group; Treaty of Tordesillas; Carnival

Week Twelve: Rain Forest and Resources: Deforestation, Biodiversity, Debt for Nature Swap; Giving Citizens a Voice: Coup de-etat, Junta, Caudilla; Income Gap: Free market, Democracy

Week Thirteen: Peninsulas: Balkan, Iberian, Scandinavian, Italian, Jutland; Mountain Ranges: Apennine, Alps, Pyrenees, Balkan; North Europe Plain, Land of the Midnight Sun; Dark Forest; North Atlantic Drift, Mistral, Sirocco; Peat, Fjord, Acid Rain; Dutch seawork, Dike, Polder, Terpen; Venice: Gondolas

Week Fourteen: Civilizations: Rome, Greece, Byzantine; Christianity and Islam Influence: Crusades, Renaissance; Bubonic Plague; Charlemagne, Martin Luther, Bonaparte; WW2- Nazis, Axis, Allis, Berlin Wall; Nordic Countries: British Imperialism, Industrialization, Social Welfare; Eastern Europe: Balkanization, Satellite Nations; European Union

Week Fifteen: Yugoslavia: Serbs, Croatia, Ethnic Cleansing; Air and Water Pollution: Causes and Solutions; EU: Seen/Unseen Consequences, Brexit

Week Sixteen: Ural & Caucus Mountains; Kamchatka Peninsula; Caspian & Aral Seas, Lake Baikal; Siberia: Tundra, Permafrost, Taiga, Steppe, Continentality; Trans-Siberian Railroad

Week Seventeen: Baltic Republics, Czar, Russian Revolution, Cold War, USSR, Command Economy, Collective Farm; Yurts, Supra, Banya, Dachas; Caspian Sea- Land of Flames; Transcaucasia, Nomadic Lifestyle; Chernobyl, Nuclear Fallout

Week Eighteen: Caucasus Unrest: Chechnya, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan; Economic Challenges: Command Economy to Market, Privatization, Distance Decay, Organized Crime; Nuclear Legacy: Political, Economic and Environmental Challenges

Week Nineteen: Rift Valley, Sahara Desert, Aquifer, Oasis, Ibn Butatta, Savannah, Serengeti Plains, Desertification, Aswan High Dam, Olduvai Gorge, Suez Canal, Colonization of Africa; Swahili, Aids

Week Twenty: Ancient Egyptians, Carthage, Nile River, Famine; Souks, Medina, Stateless Societies, Ashanti: Kente Cloth; Bantu, Congo River, David Livingstone & Henry Stanley, Berlin Conference; Fang Sculpture; Great Zimbabwe, Mutapa Empire; Apartheid, Nelson Mandela

Week Twenty-one: Commodities, Diverse Economic Systems; Epidemics: Malaria, Cholera, Tuberculosis, HIV/ Aids; Colonialism Outcomes: Political Unrest & Ethnic Tension

Week Twenty-two: Jordan River & Rift Valley, Golan Heights, Dead Sea, Tigris & Euphrates Rivers, Petra; Petroleum, Oil Spills; Iceberg Project, Qanat, Drip-irrigation, Noria, Wadi, Desalinization, Fossil Water, National Water Carrier Project

Week Twenty-three: Theocracy, Islam: Five Pillars, Ramadan; OPEC, Souk; Israel: Jerusalem, Palestine, PLO, Six Day War 1967, Kurds, Sunni and Shiite Muslims; Iraq: Operations Enduring Freedom & Operation Iraqi Freedom

Week Twenty-four: Stateless Nations: Kurds, Palestinians; Economic Diversity- Strategic Commodities, Agricultural Improvements, Developing Human Resources; Israel: West Bank, Gaza Strip; Political & Religious Turmoil; Masada

Week Twenty-five: Subcontinent; Himalayas, Mt. Everest, Indus River Valley, Deccan Plateau, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Atolls; Indo- Gangetic Plain, Climate: Monsoon; Hinduism: Ganges River, Dharma, Karma; Feni River Dam

Week Twenty-six: Mahatma Ghandi; Hinduism: Caste System; Muslim Regions: Bangladesh & Pakistan, Sultans, Ramadan, Purdah, Punjabi, Bengali; Micro-credit; Sherpa; Buddhism: Siddhartha Gautama, Mandalas

Week Twenty-seven: Population Pyramid; Summer and Winter Monsoons, Poverty; Education Demands, Illiteracy; Maharajah Rule, Kashmir: India, China or Pakistan- Territorial Nuclear Threat

Week Twenty-eight: Great Wall, Taklimakan & Gobi Deserts, Dinosaur Fossils; Port Cities: Macao, Hong Kong, Hainan Island, Korean Peninsula; Yellow & Yangtze Rivers, Grand Canal, Three Gorges Dam; Yuan Dynasty Invasion Japan, Typhoon, Kamikaze; Tibet: Dalai Lama, Autonomous Zones; Landfills: Reclaimed Land

Week Twenty-nine: Dynasties, European Spheres of Influence, Boxer Rebellion, People’s Revolution, Communist Party, Chairman Mao; Economic Reform: Trade Agreements; Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism; Population Growth; Mongolia; Taiwan: Economic Tiger, Pacific Rim; Korean Peninsula; Japan: Shogun, Samurai, Daimyo; Mt. Fuji, Kabuki Theater

Week Thirty: Ring of Fire: Tectonic Plates: Subduction Zone, Richter Scale, Earthquake, Tsunami, Warning Buoy, Seismic Building Construction; Economic Policies- Isolationism, Westernization, Industrialization; Four Tigers, Labor, Capital, Technology; Population Controls

Week Thirty-one: Indonesia, Australia, Great Barrier Reef, New Zealand, Antarctica, Polynesian Islands, Archipelago, Rain Shadow, Monsoon, Early Navigation Techniques; Outrigger Canoe vs. Voyaging, Invasive Species: Rabbits, Bikini Atoll: Nuclear Testing

Week Thirty-two: French Indochina, Vietnam War; Cambodia: Angkor Wat, Mandalas; ASEN; Krakatoa; Oceania: Micronesia, Melanesia, Polynesia; Australia: Cook, British Colonization, Aborigines; New Zealand: Maori, Haka; Antarctica: Shackleton, Endurance, Research Stations

Week Thirty-three: Australia: Aborigines, Indigenous People, Terra Nullius, Assimilation, Stolen Generation; Industrialization: Push/Pull Factors