Close to Home by John McPherson for January 08, 2009

Poor geography skills is right! I met an adult that thought that Alaska was a seperate country.

Marg, I can only hope that the adult you mentioned wasn’t from the U.S. I can’t imagine anyone dumb enough not to know that simple fact. Of course, what with the teaching skills of teachers now days, it shouldn’t surprise me at all.

Like the person who visited Mexico and said “it was a whole ‘nother country”.

Sorry about that folks…I just couldn’t resist. :-)

Hey Marge…we didn’t know you met Ms Palin! LOL

I also remember seeing a map that had the Alaska panhandle continuing all the way down the coast of BC and joining up with Washington.

margueritemPro says: Poor geography skills is right! I met an adult that thought that Alaska was a seperate country….. ..and someone we all met from Alaska this last fall thought Africa was a country.

Are you sure those weren’t the same person?

I’ve met several people who didn’t know that New Mexico was a state.

Susie Rasmussen says:

Marg, I can only hope that the adult you mentioned wasn’t from the U.S.

Unfortunately, she was. This was about 18 years ago, so I can’t blame the current schooling methods.

Here’s something that I was playing with last night. It’s a fun learning tool. http://tinyurl.com/92xg

A friend of my husband’s and I who happens to work in tech support called Dell business support one day. Unlike the normal customer support, the business customer support center is located in Texas. The guy says, oh you’re calling from Ontario! So what kind of funny accent do Canadians have? After a short pause, my friend replied that the tech support worker was listening to one of those Canadian accents.

I suppose the tech support guy did deserve some credit for knowing Ontario was in Canada.

The poor geography skills can be directly attributed to the lack of maps & globes in the typical classroom. Check out your local school and see if I’m right. I’ve homeschooled my kids, and we keep maps and globes out where we can easily refer to them. I just asked my son to tell me where each of the above countries are in the world, at least in which continent, and he did easily (without looking at a map or globe). The schools might want to consider decorating the common spaces with large map murals that the kids can look at and touch.

What good is the headwear if they can’t read?

I had a co-worker who was really looking forward to moving to Alaska because it’s right there between Hawaii and Mexico. (Look at a typical US map and you’ll see it!) And, no, it wasn’t Gov. Palin.

I may be OTD, but when I was in grade school (I am in Minnesota), my teacher told us about an acquaintance of hers from ‘back East’ who wanted to come out and visit, but needed to know when the next Indian attack was expected - and this was circa 1958! Edited to add– that may not have been geographical ignorance, but ignorance all the same!

When I lived in suburban Cleveland, I once took a call from a guy in Washington, D.C. He wanted to know what time zone I was in. As I told him “Eastern – same as you”, I silently noted the irony of the fact that the caller was from the CIA (he was conducting a background check on a job applicant). You’d think that an agency that knew what the Soviet leader had eaten for breakfast would be conversant with such basic knowledge as time zones…

Q- Where is Sudan located? A- 3 lockers down from Brazil.

I used to have a watch with a map of Europe and northern Africa on the face but no numbers. I’d look at it and have to figure out what time Netherlands ‘til Algiers was. Of course kids these days would ask “What’s a watch?” Or “Watches have hands?”

I read the following story in the paper a while back, supposedly it’s from an actual event. A woman calls a travel agent, saying: “Give me a ticket to hippopotamus, New york.” _”There’s no city by that name Ma’am.” _”Yes, it is, my sister lives there, check the map.” _”You mean Buffalo, New york?” -“Yes, that’s it. I knew it was some kind of a big animal.”

For RAmom - Good for you! I’ve talked with many home schooled children and they have the skills you’ve described. Good parents & teachers!

For Susie & others - I wouldn’t blame the teachers so much as - dare I say it - the uninterested parents & various government agencies in the US that prevent teachers from doing what most of them love to do and are VERY good at.

No, I’m not a teacher; just have several in my family who are very good and do their best with what they’re given.

BTW - This is also funny!

margueritemPro says: Here’s something that I was playing with last night. It’s a fun learning tool. Marg, that’s a great device, thanks for sharing!!!

JonD17 says: Marg, that’s a great device, thanks for sharing!!

Your welcome. Isn’t it fun? I love playing with it. Maybe some day I’ll even get 100%. ;-)

Thanks for the game Marg. Have you tried www.freerice.com? It’s not just vocabulary any more, and every correct answer donates rice to the World Food Bank.

I once got a letter addressed to me at “Podunk” County High School, when I taught at a city school, and there was no county in our state by that name. The letter was from the Geography Department of a local university.

m_ortal: I tried free rice, fun!

Are these some of the 58 states?