Cartographic Ideas and the Balkans in the Lesson Material

Authors:

Pages: 578-586

Abstract:

Geographic knowledge is one of the important components of students’ general culture. Geographical way of thinking and perception of reality (near and far) is a competency based on a system of knowledge and skills. The formation of these basic knowledge and skills is connected with the concepts, ideas and geographic images linked to them. The analysis of the didactic, methodological and psycho-pedagogical literature shows that there is a lack of a comprehensive system of concepts formation. System-bound methods, techniques and didactic technologies for influencing the emotional and sense perceptions of the students in order to activate the mechanisms of development of cartographic concepts are also missing. The vivid mental picture of the curriculum content, personal for each student, leads to increased motivation, sustained cognitive interest and deeper and solid studying of geographic knowledge. According to the normative framework of geographical education at the contemporary school, the Balkan region is studied in the eighth grade as a discipline named “Geography and Economy”, and partly in the ninth grade as regional geography. The four topics planned for studying in the section “The Balkan Peninsula” in the curriculum for the eighth grade are related to core 3: “Geographic picture of the world“ (resp. standards 2, 3 and 5). The maps have an important, but underappreciated value – they could be used to detect the logic of development of the images of the Balkans and Bulgaria. These images are multi-layered and often ambiguous. We offer a version of purposely selected and systematized two-dimensional and three-dimensional cartographic images, as well as a model for their use as a didactic tool for teaching geography and economics in the eighth grade. The expected final result is the formation of realistic complex images of the Balkans and their parts on the basis of multifaceted visual-logic connections between physical, demographic, economic and other perceptions.

Keywords:

maps, mapping, the Balkan region, geographic knowledge, the Balkan Peninsula, geographic picture, images of the Balkans

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