Special Features

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Notes to teachers:

Materials required:

This assignment requires Internet access for each team of students,
a hard copy map of Afghanistan for each team (excellent maps may be obtained at National Geographic.com), and coloring pencils or markers.

National Geography Standards addressed in this lesson:

2
How to Use Mental Maps to Organize Information About People, Places, and Environments in a Spatial Context
4
The Physical and Human Characteristics of Places
9
The Characteristics, Distribution, and Migration of Human Population on Earth's Surface
13
How the Forces of Cooperation and Conflict Among People Influence the Division and Control of Earth's Surface

This assignment capitalizes on the excellent coverage of the refugee plight in Afghanistan that was posted by The National Geographic at their web site.

During the progress of the assignment, I carried out a teacher directed discussion of the charts. I created a composite chart on the board of information provided by students for six or seven countries. We then compared the profile of life in Afghanistan to other nations chosen by the students.

Several students found this discussion to be of great use when the time came to create their summaries.

In the original lesson I included some current events material drawn from the BBC coverage of the plight of the Afghan refugees. I have deleted those materials from these copies. Should you choose to include such information, you could certainly find abundant materials on the BBC web site.

The original lesson may be viewed at my class web site.

Assignment 4
80 points

A Study of Afghanistan

This study of Afghanistan will look at the interplay of the physical geography, the politics and the people of the country.

Part One - Make a comparison chart.

1. Open the link to the CIA Factbook by clicking CIA World Factbook.

2. Using the navigation bar to the left on the screen scroll to Afghanistan and click on the link for it. A map and long lists of facts will appear on the right side of the screen.

3. Scroll down the list of facts until you come to the life expectancy facts.

4. Make a chart with four columns across and four rows down. Label the top of the far left column Afghanistan.

5. In the column on the far left side of the graph you have created note the following facts about Afghanistan: a) births per thousand. b) infant mortality rate, c) life expectancy for men, and, d) life expectancy for women.

6. In the next three columns list the same information for the United States, any nation in Europe, and any nation in Asia.

7. Write a 3 or 4 sentence summary about what may derive about the quality of life in Afghanistan and how it compares to the other nations in your study from the above information.

Part Two - Studying the environment and people of Afghanistan

1. Open the link to the National Geographic site about Afghanistan - Land in Crisis. This graphic will appear.

2. Look at all versions of the map available in the navigation bar on the left of the screen. For each map click on the enlarge button at the top of the pop up screen.

3. Write a diary entry as if you were a refugee following one of the routes shown on the drought and vegetation map at the beginning of winter.
Be sure to include references to climate, weather and travel conditions.

4. On the hard copy map of Afghanistan you received in class make a composite.
Include
A) The movements of populations because of drought before the war.
B) The movements of civilians since the beginning of the war.

5. Write a two paragraph summary regarding the following questions: What seemed to motivate population movements before the war? How have those movements changes or accelerated since the start of the war? How does the terrain of Afghanistan affect the movement patterns?

Summary

Your work for this assignment should include the following:

1. The life expectancy and mortality chart.
2. Your summary of the data in the chart.
3. Your hypothetical diary entry of a refugee.
4. The composite map of Afghanistan showing population movements from the drought and from the war.
6. Your summary of the population movements.

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