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Water Crisis on the Nile

Can you solve it?

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What makes someone an expert?

How do experts remember so much?

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The Structure of Knowledge

Governments protect and balance freedom and security.

World War II

• Security • Freedom

© 2010 H. Lynn Erickson

Dates, people, places

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Concept Attainment

  • Each group has a set of photos

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  • What are the common characteristics of each group of photos?

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Confirm Characteristics

  • Walk with a partner to try and determine the common characteristics of each group of photos.

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Reflecting on Our Work

  • At what point did you “get” the concept?
  • What makes a concept different from a fact?
  • How is it different to learn about a concept (as opposed to a fact)?

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  • How many times a day do you use water?
  • What if it ran out?

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Charting My Thinking

My initial thoughts…

My refined thoughts…

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Charting My Thinking

My initial thoughts…

  • What happens among nations of different levels of power when shared resources become scarce?

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My refined thoughts…

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The Context

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Thinking Like a Geographer

  • Spatial Thinking (e.g. map skills, resource analysis, regional differences, etc.)
  • Human-Environment Interaction Analysis (e.g. analyzing how people depend on, adapt to and modify the environment)
  • Conflict Investigation (e.g. seeking a deep understanding of dynamics of relationships among all stakeholders, objectively deciding what’s fair)

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Investigating the Conflict

  1. Each person reads 1 – 2 of the resources
  2. After reading, take turns explaining your reading
  3. What are the dynamics of the relationships among stakeholders?

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Charting My Thinking

My initial thoughts…

  • What is likely to happen in this situation?

e.g. Egypt is going to share water and not use its power to dominate South Sudan.

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My refined thoughts…

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How will we judge?

Develop criteria to evaluate potential solutions.

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Evaluate Solutions

  1. Read each solution and discuss its meaning with your team.
  2. Discuss pros and cons of each solution with team.
  3. After discussing all solutions, decide on the best solution based on the criteria.

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Checking Our Hypotheses

  • Nile Basin Initiative
  • Platform for dialogue, leadership and technical capacity
  • Egypt often refuses to participate

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Checking Our Hypotheses

  • Hydroelectric dams
  • Egypt still has not signed a new treaty

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Military Threats

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Entebbe Agreement

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Charting My Thinking

My initial thoughts…

My refined thoughts…

  • What happens among nations of different levels of power when shared resources become scarce?
  • Use evidence from the Nile situation to support

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Improve Further

  • Ask "Why? How?” to improve precision of your statement of conceptual relationship

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  • Ask “So What?” to improve significance of statement of conceptual relationship

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The Structure of Knowledge

Scarcity in resources causes conflicts between interdependent nations.

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When interdependent nations cooperate to share scarce resources for the greater good, conflict can be reduced and economic opportunities strengthened. 

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Water Crisis on the Nile

• Nation • Resources

• Power • Scarcity

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© 2010 H. Lynn Erickson

Dates, people, places

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The Structure of Knowledge

Geographers examine patterns and search for nuance across situations to increase their understanding of complex situations. 

Water Crisis on the Nile

© 2010 H. Lynn Erickson

Dates, people, places

• Patterns • Nuance

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Transfer

Let’s look at another example of scarcity in resources between nations. Does your statement still hold true?

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Whose Islands?�

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Revising My Statement

  • What slight differences or nuances can you find between the two situations?
  • Can you refine your statement based on the TWO examples?

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Transfer to New Situation

  • Research another conflict between nations over scarce resources.
  • What role does power play in this situation?
  • What new ideas add to the sophistication of your thinking?

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Synthesizing our Ideas

  • Use the rubric to write a paragraph that demonstrates your understanding of the relationship between power, nations, resources and scarcity.
  • Use evidence from as many situations as possible to support your response.

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How did your thinking improve? �

  • Clarity
  • Accuracy
  • Precision
  • Relevance
  • Depth
  • Significance
  • Fairness

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Thinking Like a Geographer

  • Spatial Thinking (e.g. map skills, resource analysis, regional differences, etc.)
  • Human-Environment Interaction Analysis (e.g. analyzing how people depend on, adapt to and modify the environment)
  • Conflict Investigation (e.g. seeking a deep understanding of dynamics of relationships among all stakeholders, objectively deciding what’s fair)

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Thinking Like a Geographer

  • What processes, strategies or skills did we use today?

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Geographers _______________________________

in order to _________________________________.

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Lesson Reflection

  • At what points in the lesson were you doing deep thinking?
  • Synergistic thinking?

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What is the relationship between concepts and the �transfer of learning?

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Lesson Steps

  • Initial response to conceptual questions
  • Learn about a specific context (topic)
  • Develop a hypothesis about the topic
  • Learn more about the context
  • Abstract to a statement of conceptual relationship supported by evidence from the context
  • Transfer to a new situation

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Sample Formative Assessment

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Sample Formative Assessment

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Key Points

  • Students must provide evidence to support their conceptual relationships.
  • Provide opportunities for students to improve their conceptual relationships in class, through concrete examples.
  • Provide opportunities for students to improve their conceptual relationships through transfer to new situations.
  • Have the students reflect on the improvement of their thinking.
  • Genuine assessments must be novel or new situations for the students.

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