GeoMaps: An interactive application to enhance map comprehension skills of students

Abstract

Geography education requires the use of spatial thinking and reasoning to understand and interpret maps. Effective usage of geographical maps is a crucial skill to be developed for students. However, it has been found that students' ability to use maps to describe and analyze natural phenomena to find solutions to geographical problems is inadequate. One reason for this shortcoming is difficulty in comprehension of maps given in textbooks or reference books, which is preliminarily due to inherent limitations with paper-based maps. Sophisticated technology-based map applications are available like interactive maps, Augmented reality-based maps, 3D view maps, etc. But there are few learning activities around these, leaving the students confused as to how these can be used in different contexts to solve problems. GeoMaps is an interactive application to improve map comprehension skills of students, which includes ability to identify, correlate and synthesize information from multiple perspectives in a map. The activities in GeoMaps are based on authentic geography problems. To solve these problems, students can overlay multiple maps to correlate various features, and choose corresponding filters to focus on particular information. The preliminary feedback from potential users is promising, encouraging us to explore this idea at a broader context.

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