UN SDG Video

This is my video of why I think Global Goals are important. 

Standard of Living Reflection

Credit- By SuSanA Secretariat [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

I think it is important to learn about standard of living because you are able to assess which countries are struggling to meet their needs and which countries do not struggle and they have a higher standard of living. Also, it is important to compare the standard of living of one country to another so we observe which countries are struggling the most. We would need to know this because this is how we can tell which countries need the most help or aid. Some countries need more aid than others. Economics and standard of living can be analyzed using the five themes of geography because location, place, movement of goods/people, human environment interaction, and region can all represent a factor that influences standard of living. For example, the location of a place has a certain standard of living. A place could have a low or high standard of living. The movement of people and goods could be low, because the wealth in that country is poor and they don’t have enough money to trade. A region could have a standard of living different from another region.

5 Themes of Geography Reflection and Project

Analyzing the world with the five themes of geography help people better understand connections between people and the earth because you can tell how people interact with the earth and related patterns, you are able to tell where things are, locate places on the map, describe the movement of people, goods, and ideas, and describe the human and physical features of an area. For example, you can tell the absolute location of an area with the exact coordinates of that place and you can also tell the relative location of an area, meaning you can tell where a place is in relation to somewhere else. Place describes what an area is like. You can use physical and human characteristics to describe what an area is like. For example, physical characteristics of a place could be specific mountains like Mount Everest, deserts like the Sahara desert, oceans including the Pacific Ocean, or climate types. Movement describes how people, goods, and ideas get from place to place. Movement of goods is how people trade goods, and commuter patterns. For example, one country could trade something for a good with another country, which is an example of the movement of goods. Lastly, region can help analyze the world because it describes the common characteristics of an area. For example, a region in Africa is the oil region because there is a lot of oil in that area, the oil is the common characteristic in that part of Africa. The most difficult theme to understand was region because I found it confusing to find the common characteristics of a certain area. I was also confused with the human and physical characteristics and how to find those in an area. I couldn’t really figure out which area had which characteristic and the resources in each area to classify a region. For example, in Africa, there is a region of physical features including deserts, mountains, and coastal plains. This was confusing for me because I couldn’t figure out where each of the regions were, and the common characteristics of the specific region.

My Map Project

This is the map of my street which was the project I chose. I tried to include everything that was on the rubric and make my first map the best I could make it. This map includes longitude and latitude lines, the houses on the street, different symbols (shown in map key), and the street.

This is the map key which includes symbols, the compass rose to determine each direction, and the list of resources I used to help me create my map of my street. This also includes the scale which measures about how far each house is apart from each other.

Map Skills Reflections

Map skills are very important to have for the outside world and if when you are looking on a map. Map skills can be very challenging, but if you use them in the real world and practice using them, they won’t be as challenging and you will understand them better. One thing that I found easy about map skills was understanding cardinal directions and the map key. I found this to be the easiest map skill because this had been taught to me in my earlier years of school and I found that these skills only had basically one step to it unlike some of the other skills. The map key was easy because I just had to match a symbol to something on the map. The cardinal direction was easy because it is just the directions that are on a map, north, south, east, and west. One thing that I struggled most with was longitude and latitude lines, and locating the direction they point on the map. For example, on the google maps I struggled finding the lines of longitude and latitude and which ways they were pointing. I found this more difficult than the rest of the map skills because I never really studied this in my past years, and it was more confusing than I had thought because the lines of longitude and latitude could be pointing in any direction, and I found that the process of finding the lines and their directions were challenging, but towards the end I started to understand more and get the hang of it. I think that basic map skills are very necessary because you should know the directions, like where north and south are, longitude and latitude lines so you know which way they are pointing which is important, and if you ever get lost or you are looking for something on a map, it would be helpful if you knew how to use a map key. Map skills will help you understand geography better because you use these skills in the real world, and you will understand how to use a map which will help you out when you get lost, or you are trying to find somewhere to go. You need to know which direction you are going, using a map key, knowing longitude and latitude lines, coordinates, and knowing where all the continents are.