MOUNTAIN MAPS IN THE WEB-BASED "SWISS WORLD ATLAS INTERACTIVE" – CHARACTERISTICS AND ADDED VALUE OR GEOGRAPHIC EDUCATION

Christian HAEBERLING, Lorenz HURNI

ABSTRACT: All modern school atlases contain topographic or thematic maps about mountainous regions. They are mostly used to teach specific landscape shapes or to show relations between thematic objects, distribution patterns or processes connected to the terrain. The new "Swiss World Atlas interactive", the online version of the established printed "Swiss World Atlas", provide also different representation types for such teaching purposes. We will give a brief overview on the geographic education in Switzerland and the current circumstances, teachers and students are faced with. Afterwards we present the "Swiss World Atlas interactive" and further related aspects of the project. In the main part we discuss different types of interactive mountain maps and representations, their functionality, and their potential educational use and added value. By using the new atlas with the relevant representations, teachers could instruct their students in an additional and attractive way about mountain related subjects.

Keywords: Thematic maps, "Swiss World Atlas interactive", online version, geographic education.

Full article here