This first year Geography textbook takes a holistic approach to Geography by incorporating elements of physical, human and regional geography, as well as bringing in methods and perspectives from spatial information science.. This textbook applies a fundamental geographical approach to understanding our globally changing world by looking at local processes which are linked to larger global processes and events. For example mining and its effects are a global issue and we can see how these unfold in BC. A further example is the recent apology to First Nation peoples on the residential school treatment, as similar events occur in the US, Ireland and Australia. Processes of urbanization, a phenomenon which people all over the globe are experiencing, can be seen in Vancouver with our discussion of the city’s development. Geography students, indeed all first year students, need to be able to critically assess their own contexts and environments in order to properly engage with our continually globalizing world.

We developed this Natural Hazards book to fill the void we found and contribute a Canadian version to the public. We both feel that Open Education Resources (OER) are an excellent way to share the body of knowledge and work of those in the Physical Geography discipline. Each chapter in this book started with a chapter drawn from another OER and then edited to our own material we have used while teaching our classes in Natural Hazards for over 15 years. We will use the feedback from our students in 2021 and 2022 classes to finalize this book too.

Essentials of Geographic Information Systems integrates key concepts behind the technology with practical concerns and real-world applications. Recognizing that many potential GIS users are nonspecialists or may only need a few maps, this book is designed to be accessible, pragmatic, and concise. Essentials of Geographic Information Systems also illustrates how GIS is used to ask questions, inform choices, and guide policy. From the melting of the polar ice caps to privacy issues associated with mapping, this book provides a gentle, yet substantive, introduction to the use and application of digital maps, mapping, and GIS.

The syllabus for GGS 103_DL2: Human Geography as taught asynchronously as a distance learning course at George Mason University.

Addresses how humans interact with the environment and how human systems are geographically distributed over space.

Table of contents:

1. Thinking Geographically
2. Geographic Tools & Methods
3. Population, Migration, & Spatial Demography
4. Interpreting Place & Cultural Landscape
5. Nature & Society
6. Agricultural & Food Systems
7. Economy & Development
8. Power, Politics, & Place
9. Geography of Religion
10. Geography of Language
11. Urban & Suburban Spaces

The purpose of this text is to promote understanding of the Geographic Information Science and Technology enterprise (GIS&T, also known as “geospatial”).

Welcome to Physical Geography at College of the Canyons.

This textbook was designed especially for College of the Canyons students, as a resource to instill the knowledge and adventure that the discipline of geography holds for so many of us. The following units will cover a wide array of topics such as: Earth’s grid system, rivers, oceans, deserts, basic geology, and cartography.

The intent of this textbook is to update and build upon the body of knowledge that exists within the geographic discipline. Unless otherwise noted within each chapter of the textbook, this body of work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

This guidebook was created by ISKME, in partnership with the Science Education Resource Center (SERC) at Carleton College. The document provides a practical reference for curators and authors of STEM OER, and contains 23 accessibility criteria, or elements, to reference as they curate, design and adapt materials to be accessible for STEM learners.

The primary audience of this resource is STEM postsecondary faculty, instructional designers, and others responsible for course design and pedagogy who seek to:

- Expand their knowledge about accessibility and ways to integrate it into their STEM curriculum and instruction
- Design openly licensed STEM courses and course materials that support both access and use by learners
- Curate existing STEM content that expands upon traditional textbooks and courseware to address variability in learning
- Identify and add meaningful keywords, or tags, to the STEM OER they create, so that their OER can be more easily discovered across platforms

Professional learning teams on campus are also encouraged to use this framework as part of training to facilitate integration of accessibility concepts into STEM course design and pedagogy.

The framework and guide development was supported by a mini-grant program facilitated by Bates College and the SCORE-UBE Network (Sustainability Challenges for Open Resources to promote an Equitable Undergraduate Biology Education), with funding from The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. The framework and guide were developed by ISKME and SERC with input from 21 STEM faculty members from across the United States, and in collaboration with the project’s Working Group of accessibility experts: Andrew Hasley and Hayley Orndorf, both with BioQUEST’s UDL Initiative and the Quantitative Undergraduate Biology Education and Synthesis (QUBES) Project; Hannah Davidson, Plymouth State University; and Cynthia Curry, National Center on Accessible Educational Materials (AEM)/CAST.

The goals of this textbook are to help students acquire the technical skills of using software and managing a database, and develop research skills of collecting data, analyzing information and presenting results. We emphasize that the need to investigate the potential and practicality of GIS technologies in a typical planning setting and evaluate its possible applications. GIS may not be necessary (or useful) for every planning application, and we anticipate these readings to provide the necessary foundation for discerning its appropriate use. Therefore, this textbook attempts to facilitate spatial thinking focusing more on open-ended planning questions, which require judgment and exploration, while developing the analytical capacity for understanding a variety of local and regional planning challenges.
While this textbook provides the background for understanding the concepts in GIS as applicable to urban and regional planning, it is best when accompanied by a hands-on tutorial, which will enable readers to develop an in-depth understanding of the specific planning applications of GIS. Chapters in this text book are either composed by the editors using Creative Common materials, or linked to a book chapter scanned copy in the library reserve. In the end of each chapter, we also provided several discussion questions, together with contextual applications through some web links.

In essay format, this textbook considers examples of various sub-categories of Geography in combination with five regions of the Western World.

The discipline of geography bridges the social sciences with the physical sciences and can provide a
framework for understanding our world. By studying geography, we can begin to understand the
relationships and common factors that tie our human community together. The world is undergoing
globalization on a massive scale as a result of the rapid transfer of information and technology and
the growth of modes of transportation and communication. The more we understand our world, the
better prepared we will be to address the issues that confront our future. There are many approaches
to studying world geography. This textbook takes a regional approach and focuses on themes that
illustrate the globalization process, which in turn assists us in better understanding our global
community and its current affairs.