1. 5 Themes of Geography
Notes:
Mrs. Miles’ Social Studies Class

2.  What is Geography?

3. What is Geography?
 Geography is the study of
Earth’s surface, lands,
features and people.

4. What are the five themes of
Geography?
 The five themes of geography are location,
place, region, human environmental
interaction (HEI) and movement.

5.  Why were the 5 themes of
Geography created?

6. Why were the 5 themes of Geography
created?
 The five themes of geography
were created by Geographers to
help them organize information.

7. The First Theme: Location
 How would you define the word location? Give
me some examples of locations.

8. Location
 Location answers the question “Where are
we?”
 In the 5 themes of Geography there are two
types of locations: Relative and Absolute
locations.

9. Absolute Location:
 Absolute location: describes an exact place on earth.
It requires latitude and longitude coordinates. It can
give you a global location (using latitude and
longitude) or a local location (street address).

10. Relative Location:
 Relative location describes the position of a place in
relation to another place. The position can be
described using landmarks, directions, time or
distance from one place to another.
 With your neighbor, describe the relative location of
Durant Road Middle School. Be prepared to share
with the class your description

11. Relative vs. Absolute Location:
Relative Location Absolute Location
 Relative location: locations  Absolute location: gives a
described specific form of location.
directions, time, landmarks or
distance.
 Example:
 The White House is
 Example: located at 1600
 Tennessee is west of North Pennsylvania Ave.
Carolina Washington D.C. 20500

12. Place:
 Place is defined as an area that has features
that distinguish them from other places. Places
are unique.
 Place describes the human and physical
characteristics of a location.

13. Place – Physical Features
Landforms, climate, wildlife, natural resources,
architecture, mountains, rivers and other
factors that make a place unique.

14. Place – Human Features
Language, food, religion, ethnicity, clothing,
customs, government and other factors

15. Critical Thinking:
 What is the difference between location and
place?

16. Human Environmental Interaction
(HEI):
 HEI looks at the relationship between people
and their environment.
 3 categories of HEI: depend, adapt and modify
 What are some examples of how we depend
upon, adapt and modify our environment?

17. HEI Activity:
 Get out a sheet of paper.
 You are going to listen to the story The Lorax
by Dr. Seuss.
 You are going to write down examples of HEI.

18. Region:
 A region is an area that is defined by certain
similar characteristics. Those similar
characteristics can be
physical, natural, human or cultural.
 Have you heard about or can you name any
examples of regions?
 Regions are a way to describe and compare
places

19. Region:
Regions can be defined in many different ways.
For example:
1.) Language type
2.)Landform groups (Piedmont, Coastal plain,
mountains)
3.)Government or political regions

20. Regions

21. Movement:
Movement describes how people,
products/goods, information and ideas move
from in between countries. (or from one place
to another)
*How do ideas and information move?
*How do products/good move?
*How do people move?

22. Movement of goods/products