Geography

Geography was quite a practical subject with me. I travelled a lot through the Czech Republic and also through other countries. I learned more about these countries and places I'd been to. It's always much more interesting for me to learn about places I've already been to.

I've written about my travels elsewhere on this page, so I won't repeat it. I'll just add that I brought a lot of brochures and maps from my travels. When we were in some interesting place, we would often visit museums. That was very important because often you can find out more about a country in a museum, than you could ever find on websites or in books. When the exhibitions in a museum are well done, clearly arranged and detailed, it is a pleasure to spend a whole day there and a lot can be gained from the visit. I've been to many museums and I've also talked to foreigners and to my penpals about their countries.

I had textbooks, books and websites too and they were just as helpful. We have a set of books called "People and Countries". There is one book about each continent and in it are all the countries, their maps, their flags, facts about the country, it's brief history etc. I also read travelogues a lot and other stories taking place in foreign countries and dealing with geography in one way or another. Sometimes I would just look at a map of the world and find rivers, seas, mountains and countries on it and name their capitals.

I also helped plan our journeys and find interesting places and cities on the maps. When we travelled through Sweden, my dad was the driver and I was the navigator. I found the best routes and places to sleep and then sat in the car and navigated him with the help of a map.

I took some travel magazines and cut pictures out of them and made these essays about countries (this one is about China):

This geography textbook was one of my favorites: