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XXV CONCEPTS IN GEOGRAPHY- TEACHING AND LEARNINGCHALLENGES OFFERED BY CHANGES IN THE HONG KONG ADVANCED LEVEL GEOGRAPHY CURRICULUM L. Francis To include the development of concepts among the aims of a geography curriculum raises important questlOns about the structure of geography itself. This paper explores the view that geography can be seen to be structured about a hierarchy of interrelated concepts. In teachmg a curriculum devised around a series of defined concepts the teacher may need to reorientate the approaches adopted in the c\assroom. This becomes necessary as a curriculum based on conceptual learmng places greater emphasis on the development of the student's thinking and reasoning abi1ities than do traditional curricula. Some implications from research into conceptuallearning are drawn upon to indicate the sort of practices that are required if the student's needs are to be adequately. me t. To illustrate the sorts of approaches that might be adopted examples are drawn from areas that are appli. cable to the new A-l..evel course in Hong Kong. Frequent changes in the school curriculum tend to produce in teachers a feeling of uncertainty, a sense of being threatened and, perhaps, even one of antagonism towards the curnculum designers. These sorts of feelings and attitudes have been produced by committees wlth which 1have been associated in South Australia. lt would seem that there is a great deal of built-in inertia among teachers who feel secure amidst the known and are suspicious of the unknown. The South Australian and, 1believe, the Australian experience in general has been that once the imtial shock waves have died down teachers accept the challenges and opportunities offered by the changed circumstances. Acceptance derives part1y from becoming familiar with the changes and partly from understanding the nature and imphcations of the changes. The responsibility for converting any curriculum document into classroom practices rcsts heavily on the teacher but guidance,advice,explanatlOn , encouragement and education must be readily forthcoming from those responsible for devising the changcs. 396 L. FRANCIS Changes m curricula can be divided crudely into two parts: 如仗， changes m content and matter and second, changes in the phi1osophical and educational base about which the curriculum is designed. It can be 缸gued that change in content presents a lesser challenge and poses fewer problems for the teacher for it is a situation that must be faced constantly. Not only does a new topic, such as one associated with environmental issues, present the teacher with a cha1lenge but so too does the problem of keeping the data on any topic up to date. One need only look at some aspect of populatlOn, trade, economic or agricultural studies to appreclate how rapidly things change. Here the cha1lenge hes m findmg appropriattl material to supplcment the text book which, as we are all aware, is out of date even before it reaches the market. It is changes in the philosophical or educational structure of a cur. riculum that cause the greatest concern and offer the greatest challenge. Such changes require a reorientation of thinking and a modification of teachii1g practices if they are to be imp\emented. It is to thc changes ofthis kind m the proposed A.l..evel course that 1 want to direct my attention and to explore some of the possiblc responses to the challenges the course can be seen to offer At a superficia1 \evel, at least, the following quotation is probably apt, app1ying not on1y to changes thát are under way in Hong Kong but to changes that have been taking place in geography curricula in Austra1ia, New Zea1and, the United Kingdom and ~orth America during the 1ast decade. ‘Geography has an intellectual va1ue which has been until recent\y strange1y over1ooked. Former1y the study of Geography was :t mere memory exercise, and conslsted of 1itt\e e1se than the recital of 1ists 01' boundaries, mountains, rivers, productlOns and manufactures. Today the child's powers of observa. tion, of imagmation, of reflectlOn and of reasonmg are all called into re. qU!sition in the teaching of geography' (Dexter and Garlick, 1905). This quotation is interesting m at 1east two respects. In the first instance it directs aUention to aspects of the child's thinking processes beyond mere recall as it refers to imagination, reflection and reasoning. It IS to some of these charac. teristlcs that curricu1um designers both here and elsewhere have been direct. ing attention, not on1y in statements of objectives and aims but a1so in recom. mendations...

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