Welcome to the Geography of Alaska. My hope is that you will find the course both informative and interesting. Geography literally means “description of the earth’. Thus, geography demands high visual content, whether it is through direct images of landscapes or through art, diagrams and graphs, or the written word. My challenge is to find the right descriptions to help you understand Alaska’s amazing human and physical geography as well as  to introduce you to methods of geographic analysis to give us a deeper understanding of the Alaskan landscape.

Blog Overview

You are required to write 6 blogs during the course. For instructions on how to post your blog to the entire class, please refer to the Blackboard instructions.

Blog 1 is for introducing yourself.

Blog 2 focuses on maps and the different perspectives they give us about Alaska.

In Blog 3, we will look at hazardous places in Alaska and determine what areas are the most hazardous and the least hazardous-and what that means.

In Blog 4 is an assignment  entry you will post in Blackboard. We will all look at one settlement, Shishmaref, and examine its geographic characteristics.

For Blog 5, I will assign each of you a specific settlement to study. The settlements will cover all regions of Alaska. So, reading the posts of other students will give you some insights into other regions of the state.

For Blog 6 I would like to have you identify web sites that would be valuable for the’¨class.

Blog Names and Identity
If you don’t feel comfortable using your real name to blog from, you are free to write under a pseudonym. If you do, please be sure and tell me the name you are blogging as so that I can grade your assignments appropriately. You can change your name on the blog by logging in and going to the “User’ section to update your display name.