AP Human Geography

Course Description

AP Human Geography seeks to introduce students to the systematic study of patterns and processes that have shaped human understanding, use, and alteration of Earth’s surface. Students will employ spatial concepts and landscape analysis to examine human social organization and its environmental consequences. Students will also learn and use the methods and tools geographers utilize in their science and practice.

AP Website Link: https://apstudent.collegeboard.org/apcourse/ap-human-geography

Course Goals

• Use and think about maps and spatial data. Maps and spatial data are fundamental to understanding the ways in which patterns on Earth’s surface reflect and influence physical and human processes. Learning to use and think about maps is critical to geographical literacy.
• Understand and interpret the implications of associations among phenomena in places. Geography looks at the world from a spatial perspective, seeking to understand the changing spatial organization and material character of Earth’s surface. One of the critical advantages of a spatial perspective is the attention it focuses on how phenomena are related to one another in particular places.
• Recognize and interpret at different scales the relationships among patterns and processes. Geographical analysis requires a sensitivity to scale, not just as a spatial category but as a framework for understanding how events and processes at different scales influence one another
• Define regions and evaluate the regionalization process. Geography is concerned not simply with describing patterns but with analyzing how they came about and what they mean.
• Characterize and analyze changing interconnections among places. At the heart of a geographical perspective is a concern with the ways in which events and processes operating in one place can influence those operating at other places.

Start of Year Course Handouts