Europe and the United States: the implementation of geographic information systems in secondary education in two contexts

Abstract

Since its inception in the early 1990s, geographic information science and its related technology, geographic information systems (GIS), have diffused slowly into select groups of K-12 classrooms worldwide. The technology has not been adopted at a rate commensurate with expectations. The purpose of this article is to explore GIS implementation by comparing the variable status of GIS education in pre-collegiate education in the United States and Europe and factors that appear to play a role in diffusion. The authors use a model of internal and external factors that influence adoption of education innovation as a heuristic to compare and draw conclusions.

Developing trainee teacher practice with geographical information systems (GIS)

“…It is widely proposed that spatial thinking skills can be developed with GIS (e.g. Akinyemi, 2016;Huynh 2009); it can empower students to think spatially (Lee and Bednarz, 2009), ask spatial questions (Nellis, 1994), visualise spatial data (Marsh, Golledge & Battersby, 2007), perform spatial analysis (Bednarz & van der Schee, 2006) and, thereby, to become active learners of geography.…”

An Investigation of the Use of Real-Time, Authentic Geospatial Data in the K–12 Classroom

“…Although geospatial technologies have become widely used and access costs have declined, the integration of such technologies within the classroom has been alarmingly slow (Kerski 1999;Baker and Bednarz 2003). Some of the reasons for this slow integration of geospatial technologies into the classroom include a dearth of research on its effectiveness (Baker and Bednarz 2003), design issues related to geographic information systems (GIS) and web-based geospatial technologies (Green 2001), a general lack of geographic pedagogical content models (Doering, Veletsianos, and Scharber, in press), a shortage of related curricula, low dissemination of geospatial technology into K-12 schools (Bednarz and Schee 2006), and non-existent and/or ineffective teacher training models .…”

The Influence of Geoinformation Systems Using on the Geography Perception

“…Důvodů, proč zařadit GIS do výuky zeměpisu je, podobně jako definic, taky mnoho. Wiegand (2003) [5] vyzdvihuje zařazení geografických informačních [6] uvádějí tři hlavní důvody, proč učitelé používají GIS: (1) GIS podporují vyučování a učení se zeměpisu (geografii); (2) GIS jsou pomůckou k řešení geografických úloh na různé úrovni; (3) GIS jsou nevyhnutelným nástrojem pro svět v 21. století. Na druhou stranu existuje i řada překážek, které jsou pro učitele závažné a kvůli kterým GIS nebo jakékoli jiné geoinformační technologie nezařazují.…”