Abstract:

In recent years several innovative methodologies and strategies have been proposed for and implemented in the teaching of geography at the university level. Many of these innovations place emphasis on the application of modern technologies, such as the use of web-based approaches and various forms of geospatial technology. Such innovations provide considerable utility and offer several advantages over pedagogical endeavors that rely solely on traditional classroom instruction. However, by themselves the application of these technologies, in some cases the widespread reliance upon them, will never function as adequate substitutions for the activity that will forever remain the hallmark of a geographic education: actual fieldwork. This paper offers a pedagogical module that utilizes a place-based approach, combined with active and experiential learning, to explore the geography of Belleville, a neighborhood in Paris, France. By providing a spatially focused, yet inter-disciplinary approach to the study of this single neighborhood, this module provides a pedagogical forum to explore the various ways that Belleville has both impacted and been impacted by the wider world. Accordingly, this place-based methodology uses a geographical lens to understand how the evolving nature of Belleville, and by extension the nature of France, relates to the intersections of various demographic, cultural, political, and economic processes operating at the global scale.

Keywords:

Geography, place-based education, France, pedagogical innovations, active and experiential Learning.