Regional Geography And Graphic Organisers. Geography-Specific And Didactic Competences In University

Abstract

Quality training to become a teacher is a prerequisite for a good start in the educational system. Therefore, assessing the quality of this training and improving the future teachers' both scientific and didactic competence levels is crucial. Our research started from the observation that Geography university students at the Faculty of Geography, in Babeș-Bolyai University, from Cluj-Napoca, Romania, who train during the Psychological and Pedagogical module in order to become teachers, have difficulties in approaching Regional Geography topics. To identify the differences between their competence levels, we analysed the graphic organisers realised by these students at diverse specialisations by means of an assessment tool. Students elaborated the graphic organisers as homework. Each of these students had to realise a graphic organiser for another country. Their products were analysed according to a series of criteria: included information, data correctness, the criteria they used to classify or systemise information, etc. Findings showed the challenges these students had to cope with and their competence level in elaborating cluster-type GOs for Regional Geography topics during their university studies.

The Anthropic Impact On Relief And Vegetation. Case Study: Valea Ierii

“…Poor understanding of the geographical processes is also explained by the fact that, in the Geography Curriculum in pre-university education in Romania (Ministry of National Education, 2017), only small-time resources are given to these issues (Cuc, 2019a(Cuc, , 2019b, and students acquire little knowledge which would be needed to understand the impact of human society on the environment (Chiș, Magdaș, Dulamă, & Moldován, 2019), including the relief and vegetation. At the university level, students are involved in lecture room learning activities (Cuc, 2012) and in practical activities in which they investigate geographical processes (Ilovan, 2019;Ilovan et al, 2018aIlovan et al, , 2019bIlovan et al, , 2019cMagdaș, Ilovan, Dulamă, & Ursu, 2018;Rus et al, 2019), but in only a few activities, their level of competence to explain geographical processes will be evaluated in real life contexts (Dulamă, Ursu, Ilovan, & Voicu, 2019;Ilovan et al, 2019a;Koszinski et al, 2019).…”

Some Geography Teachers’ Perceptions of Graphic Organizers

“…At university level, the first graphic organizer was also the cluster type, and its selection was also made depending on the approached content and its degree of difficulty. Although this graphic organizer seems easy to realize, studies revealed a series of problems regarding the degree of coverage of the entire topic with essential information and details, the systematization of information based on criteria, correctness, originality and relevance of information, highlighting the relations between the information (Koszinski et al, 2019).…”

Visual Representations of a Regional Economic Subsystem. An Analysis

“…Research in the didactics of geography in Romania was focused on building and testing analytical assessment grids for reproductive competences, developed for geography students: to elaborate topographic profiles (Osaci-Costache et al, 2013b), to elaborate column charts (Osaci-Costache et al, 2013a). Other studies focused on using analytical assessment grids for productive competences in geography: to elaborate touristic plans (Osaci-Costache et al, 2013), to elaborate proposals of spatial planning measures for river basins (Dulamă, Ilovan & Niţoaia, 2016), to analyse the cultural landscape (Dulamă, Vana & Ilovan, 2016), to elaborate graphic organizers (Koszinski et al, 2019), to analyse landscapes during geography university studies (Ilovan et al, 2019), and to represent urban space (Dulamă et al, 2020).…”