The Geography Classroom

Across Africa, a continent where the average age is about 19, protests have flared against leaders who may have outstayed their welcome.

 

This interactive mapping feature compares two distinct data sets in an attempt to show that the two are correlated on the continent of Africa.  The base layer of this thematic map is demographic, noting how much of the overall population in a given country is under the age of 16.  The interactive feature with point data describes the political unrest or instability in that particular country. 

 

Questions to ponder: Does the cartographer 'convince' you that Africa's having a very young (globally speaking) demographic cohort led towards greater political instability?  Are there other factors worth considering?  What does this map and it's embedded data tell us?    

 

Tags: Africa, political, conflict, unit 4 political, states, governance, population, demographics, unit 2 population. 

Via Seth Dixon

mixed used train-tracks/market place...

 

I've used similar videos in my classes and students are usually quite shocked to see how a city like Bangkok, Thailand operates.  I've used this as a 'hook' for lessons of population growth, urbanization, economic development, sustainability, megacities and city planning. 

Via Seth Dixon

I found these cartograms from an article in the Telegraph and was immediately impressed. The cartograms originated here and use data from the Global Rural-Urban Mapping Project as to create the int...

 

This series of cartograms shows some imbalanced populations (such as the pictured Australia) by highlighting countries that have established forward capitals.  Question to ponder: Do forward capitals change the demographic regions of a country significantly enough to justify moving the capital? 

Via Seth Dixon