The Importance of School World Atlases According to Czech Geography Teachers

Abstract

Over 600 geography teachers answered an online survey containing 30 questions about school world atlases, an integral part of geography education. The study measured the importance and frequency of use of atlases, identified the most frequently used school atlases, and determined the type of tasks solved with atlases and the supplementary teaching aids used. The authors analysed the individual responses of teachers and investigated the relationships between the various responses. To maximise the survey’s information value, many of the questions were open-ended, and teachers responded in the form of plain text. To extract information from these answers, linguistics methods were used. Teachers assessed the importance of atlases as essential. Over 90% of them used atlases in either every lesson or every second lesson. The most important factor in the use of atlases was the experience of the teachers. Those with longer praxis used atlases more often than less experienced teachers. Teachers considered thematic maps as the most problematic part of the atlases. The most frequently solved tasks were the simplest, such as identifying objects on a map. The findings of the survey quantified the importance of atlases in geography education and can assist geography teachers, atlas publishers, and cartographers in general.

Keywords

• atlas
• map
• survey
• questionnaire
• geography education
• digital atlas