After 17 years of teaching I am not surprised but saddened by the amount of geographical knowledge my students have coming to me. I just do the best I can with what time I have.
My big goals:
Teach that Africa is not a country.
Everything after that is just gravy because I have increased geographical awareness by 95%
Yep, I'm constantly amazed at just how little people in general (let alone young students) know about geography, even within their own areas (local and state).
Most everywhere else outside North America, knowing about other countries, cultures, and languages is a necessity - but not for us. Adding to that is a news media that is entirely myopic and mired in pop culture and social agendas rather than actually producing news. I have to watch BBC news and listen to their radio shows to hear what's going on in the world.
When I had more time in my classes I would show a BBC student news feed. My students would not even come close to understanding what was going on with the news around the world. But it helped.
