August 2010 Archives

Read the August 2010 Newsletter: "Inspire students to take action this year!"

INSIDE:
Editor's Pick: Special Guest Blogger Elisabeth Soep talks about her inspiring new book,
Drop That Knowledge: Youth Radio Stories.

August Challenge: Plan a service-learning project
GeoFeature: 4-H2O: National Youth Science Day
GeoNews: U.N. declares "International Year of Youth"
Blog: A Kid, a Campaign, Iceland

"...Young people can use media to learn about places close to home and far away. The connections they form seem to shrink the physical distance that separates citizens around the world, even as they can reveal disparate experiences and inequalities that young reporters examine through their media stories."










We've all heard the stories of major news organizations struggling in the digital age of new media. If there's a silver lining to the decline of the media behemoths, it's the emergence of more opportunities for diverse perspectives in reporting. For more than 15 years, Youth Radio has been helping under-served young people develop strong leadership, journalism, and media production skills. The National Geographic Education Foundation has supported Youth Radio's work fostering story-telling and civic engagement around local and global issues through grant contributions to the organization. Now, we are excited to join Youth Radio in celebrating the release of a new book about the success of their empowering, educational programs.

There's nothing like a newsroom to make the world feel big and small at the same time. Put young people in charge, and the effect can be even more extreme. At Youth Radio, a Peabody Award-winning, youth-driven production company headquartered in Oakland, California, young people produce stories distributed through global broadcast and digital outlets including National Public Radio, The Huffington Post, iTunes, and YouTube. At a single editorial meeting at Youth Radio, young people and their adult producers might pitch stories on the effects of budget cuts inside local Oakland schools, young soldiers returning from the Iraq war, healthcare reform in a rural Kentucky town, and the transnational Korean musical genre known as K-POP. Inside these freewheeling discussions are recurring teachable moments through which young people can use media to learn about places close to home and far away. The connections they form seem to shrink the physical distance that separates citizens around the world, even as they can reveal disparate experiences and inequalities that young reporters examine through their media stories.

In my new book, Drop That Knowledge: Youth Radio Stories, Vivian Chávez and I take readers behind the scenes at Youth Radio, inside meetings and stories like the ones I've just described. In each chapter, we present a series of Youth Radio media features, detail the negotiations and inquiries that supported their production, and then highlight implications for learning, teaching, journalism, and media justice efforts.

The virtues enshrined in the Boy Scout Law--trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, reverent--date back more than a century to founder Lord Robert Baden-Powell's original manual, Scouting for Boys.
 

Fine attributes, to be sure, but they beg one important question: Where's the geo??? To scout about, after all, a boy scout needs to know how to read or make a map, what's where, and how to get there.

So National Geographic Education pitched its tents, two big ones ... 


 

... at the National Centennial Boy Scout Jamboree near Fredericksburg, Virginia a few weeks ago and invited the assembled teens to view the world through our lens. More than 20,000 stopped by and did just that.

In case you aren't a boy or a scout or otherwise couldn't make it, here are a few highlights of what we shared:

IT DOESN'T JUST GROW ON TREES

 Well, some of what we eat does, but most of us rarely see our food get grown or raised. Often, we don't even know where it comes from. We gave scouts photos of familiar fruits, veggies, nuts, and meats and asked them to find the countries that export them most on a giant map of the world.
 

THE PLANET THROUGH ANIMAL EYES

Animals may share the Earth with us, but their worldview's entirely different. That's why National Geographic's remote imaging team developed Crittercam...



... a suite of high-tech, industrial-strength cameras that strap or stick to animals, then pop off for retrieval and a bona fide creature's-eye look at the landscape. Here, intrepid intern Matt sports Crittercam's ever-popular "KidCam."

Read the July 2010 Newsletter: Use geotechnology to uncover ancient and modern-day mysteries this summer!

Inside
July Challenge: Give geocaching or earthcaching a go!
GeoFeature: Gravestones and GPS
GeoNews: Join Expedition: Mongolia
Blog: Find bargains near you

Plus: more newsletter highlights on the next page!

August is kind of a crazy month.

Here in Washington, D.C., the trains are nearly empty as Congress begins its summer recess and thousands of non-profit staffers (like we here at National Geographic Education) make use of their oft-generous vacation leave. Fewer numbers of bodies on the Metro mean slightly cooler, more comfortable conditions--a welcome change in the midst of a record-breaking heat wave sweeping the Eastern U.S.

What exactly is a heat wave, anyway, I wonder? Is the definition the same in Nova Scotia and New Mexico? What was the hottest temperature ever recorded in the U.S.--and where was it?

This short, 5-question quiz from Family Education provides some answers to these questions (just make sure to click the little link at the top right of the screen when an advertisement pops up to go back to the quiz--it's not too distracting).

Unfortunately, It's not clear that the scorching temperatures will abate any time soon. Climate change is conspiring against us, after all, and we are smack-dab in the middle of the Dog Days of Summer, to boot.

Do you know where the phrase "Dog Days of Summer" comes from?

Ok, so you've heard us talk about GIS (Geographic Information Systems) before on this blog. A LOT.

But let's be honest: Chances are you've probably never actually used a GIS to analyze geographic data and make maps. Most casual geography buffs don't have their own license for a GIS software package such as ArcGIS, which is usually purchased by businesses or universities. And if you're not a classroom teacher, then you've probably never used AEJEE, either, a free GIS "lite" program for educators and students.

Well, now's your chance to give GIS a shot!