Social Studies 4: U.S. Geography Subtopics
The study of geography in terms of the United States is actually the study of many, many different subtopics. Well…great. That sounds like a lot of work.
| 4th Grade | Social Studies |
| Elementary and Middle School | 4th Grade |
| Language | English Language |
Transcript
And Earth is a pretty big place, with a whole lot of different stuff going on.
Not the kind of subject you can study for 10 minutes and call it a day. [Student closing his laptop]
There's physical geography, which includes landforms also known as the surface of the [Coop pointing at a blackboard]
Earth like mountains, plains and plateaus...
...bodies of water, including oceans, seas, rivers, lakes,
and everything in between.
In this one subtopic alone, we've got the vastness of the ocean and the entire surface [Boy in a dingy being circled by sharks]
of the Earth.
And we're only skimming the surface, like this guy. [Man water skiing flies into the air]
The Earth also has many different climates and climate zones.
If this subtopic is the focus of a particular geographer
they could look at the weather and temperature of an [Man looking confused at a computer]
area over time.
And then compare it to the climate of another area.
And another area.
And another.
It doesn't leave a lot of time for Sudoku solving. [Person playing Sudoku]
Another subtopic of geography is population.
Focusing on this subtopic would lead a researcher to look at where people live, why they live
there, and how they move about. [Man looking at screens about people]
They might also consider the population density of a specific area... [Video of a busy city]
And then compare it to another area.
And another.
And well, yeah, you're probably starting to get the idea.
Biomes are another subtopic.
A biome is an area of natural land where certain plant and animal wildlife are able to survive. [Dino pointing at a blackboard]
As you can probably imagine, America has plenty of different biomes, ranging from cactus-filled [Man stuck in a biodome]
deserts to lush green forests, to studio apartments. [Man in his apartment]
Believe it or not, even the economy can be considered a geographic subtopic. [Coop pointing at a blackboard]
Sure, you might think it's better suited for the field of finance, but the physical geography [Lots of dollar bills going round in circles]
and climate of a region can significantly impact an area's economy. [A clown in a busy city]
Hawaii's warm weather and beautiful beaches attract tourists year-round, while the Midwest's
low population density allows for many of its states to be filled with farms instead.
Yeah, not a lot of guided wheat field tours. [Tour guide showing people round a field of wheat]
Regardless of subtopic, geographers in the United States often use maps as tools to represent [Dino pointing at a blackboard]
the various areas they study, while commonly dividing America into four regions: the North, [The US broken into four different colours]
South, Midwest and West.
To say you're studying “geography” means you're simply studying Earth. [Planet Earth rotating]
But within that topic exists countless subtopics, each with an endless amount of information
to learn and consider.
Unfortunately, no matter how much you learn about the planet we call home, you will never [Man looking annoyed because he can't find the remote]
be able to find the television remote.
It's whereabouts are one of life's great mysteries. [The dog has the remote in its mouth]