example: the nature of geographical intuition
Kong (1999, 2000) has argued that children and adolescents in highly-urbanised Singapore view nature as something which is orderly and well-maintained. She continues that this rather limited perception arises from the fact that nature is "a ‘waste of time’. All the teenage members of the school group acknowledged that nature was not very much a part of their consciousness. When bored and thinking about places to visit and what things to do, the tendency was not to think of activities associated with nature. When thoughts about the natural world did surface in their minds, it was often in the context of school work, for example, their geography lessons, during which nature was more about conceptual issues and scientific processes than everyday environments of potential fun and enjoyment" (Kong, 1999:3).
It is our considered position that such “everyday environments of potential fun and enjoyment” constitute the substrate upon intuitions about geography – intuitions about the nature of the man-land relationship – are formed and developed. Such intuitions, in turn, shape geographical ways of knowing, and are thus critical to informing how novice geographers (such as students in school) approach and understand the world.