Asking Students about Sense of Place

photo by @peapilot

So, I have a presentation about how to connect to place next week. I will be talking to Grade 6 students about how to eventually take action, but how to be aware, and know a place before we take action. Before I really started putting together this presentation I asked my kids what they thought about what I was going to get into.

The major themes I want to get into are connection and isolation. The main things they wanted me to show and talk about are where are you (and how do you know) and what is around you (like animals and things like this).

I want to explore the tension between technology and the environment and how technology can connect and isolate. For instance, something like skype (I’m about to talk to my parents soon) connects me (seemingly) to my home, my home community and my life in Canada. However, sometimes, it can be isolating. Since Singapore could be almost any city (most major cities have similarities) could my instant connection to my old place, make it harder to connect to my new place (because I can easily leave using technology). There are a ton of apps that show us how things are around us too. Citizen science has taken us pretty far.

One of the talks that really got me going was is google maps isolating? Now we use maps that are so individual they have the opportunity to isolate from place, they only help us navigate to places. We don’t have to know a place, we don’t have to pay attention to the land or to signs, we just have to listen to when to turn.

I think that I can prepare some materials now.

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