Contextualization

The world is full of fascinating landscapes, cities, and landmarks waiting to be explored. But how can we understand and navigate through all these places without getting lost? That's where maps come in! Maps are incredible tools that condense a wealth of information, such as locations, geographical elements, routes, and much more into a simple piece of paper or a digital device.

In Geography, reading maps is essential to understand our location in the world, the relationships between different places, and the nature of the physical world. However, to read and understand maps, we need to master a series of skills and concepts, such as orientation, scale, symbology, and geographic coordinates.

Introduction

This interdisciplinary project, involving Geography and History, aims to develop your map-reading skills and broaden your understanding of how landscapes have transformed over time. You will work in groups, where each member will play an important role in completing the tasks and achieving the defined objectives.

The central activity of the project is to analyze the evolution of a specific city or region using maps from different periods. In addition to printed maps, you will use aerial and satellite images, as well as photographs from different periods, to understand how the landscape has changed over time.

Importance

Why is it important to learn about maps and how they can help us understand changes in the landscape? Well, maps are used in many areas of our daily lives. They are used by meteorologists to predict the weather, by urban planners to design cities, by tourists to find places of interest, and by geographers to understand Earth's patterns and processes.

Understanding changes in the landscape is also crucial. Cities and landscapes are constantly changing due to natural events or human actions. Changes in the landscape can have many impacts, including climate change, habitat loss, and modifications to urban infrastructure.

Practical Activity

Activity Title: "Timeline of the Landscape: A Cartographic Journey"

Project Objective:

The purpose of this project is to lead students to study a city or region in detail, using different types of maps to understand how this area has changed over time. The practical activity is divided into stages, which will take place over several days, in order to provide a comprehensive and in-depth experience in map-reading and landscape analysis.

The project will be carried out in groups of 3 to 5 students, with an estimated duration of 15 to 20 hours per student, taking into account both research and analysis work, as well as the completion of the final report.

Detailed Project Description:

Each group must choose a city or region and, using different types of maps and images, such as historical maps, aerial photographs, and satellite images, investigate changes in the landscape of that area over time.

Concepts such as orientation, scale, symbology, geographic coordinates, as well as the ability to analyze and interpret urban transformations over time, will be studied, based on the comparison of images and maps from different historical moments.

Required Materials:

• Internet access
• Printed maps, if available
• Computers or tablets
• Writing and drafting materials

Project Stages:

1. Selection of the study area: Each group must choose a city or region to investigate. It can be the place where they live, a location they are studying in the classroom, or a place of interest.

2. Research: Students must research different types of maps and images related to the chosen location, covering as long a period of time as possible.

3. Analysis and comparison: Groups must analyze the maps and images, identifying significant changes in the landscape and associating them with corresponding historical events.

4. Report: Each group must compile their findings into a written report, explaining in detail the observations and conclusions supported by the analyzed images and maps.

Project Deliverables:

Students must submit a written report, in the form of a scientific article, containing the following sections:

• Introduction: Contextualization of the project and justification for the choice of the study area.

• Development: Presentation of the applied theory, detailed description of the methodology used, presentation of the analyzed maps and images, and in-depth discussion of the results obtained.

• Conclusions: Recap of the main points addressed, presentation of the learnings and conclusions drawn from the project.

• Bibliography: Indication of the sources used for the project, whether books, websites, videos, apps, among others.

This report should be consistent with the activities carried out during the project, reflecting the group's understanding, discoveries, and conclusions regarding the transformation of the landscape of the studied location, presenting analyses of maps, aerial photographs, and satellite images.