Reply #19: wow! I teach something that's too expensive to test!

[Lisa]

Asking kids to find something on a map is too expensive? Having them bring a newspaper clipping, to put up on the classroom wall and discuss (like my Soc Studies teacher in elementary school used to do) is too expensive? Or getting them to bring in their favorite tacky souvenir from another country or state, so the class can think about what it does -- and doesn't -- reveal about that place, is too expensive?

If all of this is "too expensive" -- they should consider how much ignorance costs.



p.s. actually, it CAN be quantified. This article was circulated by the chair of our geography department.

"Insensitive computer programmers with little knowledge of geography have cost the giant Microsoft company hundreds of millions of dollars in lost business and led hapless company employees to be arrested by offended governments."
"In a frank assessment of the company's problems in trying to be a global player without offending local sensibilities, Tom Edwards, its senior geopolitical strategist, said employees' lack of basic geography was to blame. The company has now launched geography classes for its staff to avoid further bloomers which have caused embarrassment and cost money on a grand scale."

http://technology.guardian.co.uk/online/news/0,12597,1286066,00.html