Rafael de Miguel González

The teaching of climate change in geography is frequently reduced to a curricular content, whereas it is a systemic, multi-scalar and axiologically contested phenomenon whose understanding calls for expert geographical reasoning. This article is a conceptual and methodological contribution: it sets out the epistemological foundations and the research design of a comparative study of climate change teaching in Spanish and French geography education, and analyses no new empirical dataset. The framework rests on four analytical continua—organisation of knowledge, causal structure, treatment of scale and the fact–value relation—derived from a single operative definition of expert geographical reasoning and formulated so that one grid may interrogate curricular texts, focus groups, interviews and a questionnaire within a multiphase exploratory sequential design of qualitative priority. Its first phase has been conducted and published: a focus-group study that calibrated the precursor categories of the present continua and showed that value-laden and epistemically regulated registers coexist within expert discourse. Those findings are used here as prior published evidence; the three remaining phases are presented as a proposed design. It is argued that the Spain–France comparison operates as a device of epistemological denaturalisation, and that coherence derives not from accumulating instruments but from subordinating them to one analytical lens, whose risks are also discussed.

La creación de la Comisión de Educación Geográfica, de la Unión Geográfica Internacional, en 1952, y de EUROGEO, la Asociación de Geógrafos Europeos, en 1979, ha permitido durante varias décadas la colaboración internacional entre didactas de la geografía y, consecuentemente, el intercambio, la difusión y la innovación de ideas, concepciones y métodos para la enseñanza de la geografía y de un mundo cada vez más integrado por los procesos de globalización territorial: política, económica, social y cultural.A pesar de la gran influencia de la geografía anglosajona en la producción científica de esta disciplina, en cualquiera de sus especialidades, los estrictos condicionantes de los marcos curriculares y las rutinas de las respectivas sociedades geográficas nacionales han servido para que la educación geográfica necesite de un diálogo intenso entre diferentes tradiciones culturales relativas al qué enseñar y cómo enseñar geografía en educación primaria, y especialmente secundaria. No es casualidad que la Comisión de Educación Geográfica de la Unión Geográfica Internacional sea una de las más numerosas y diversas, entre las cuarenta y siete comisiones de la UGI, ni que EUROGEO surgiera como una iniciativa conjunta de profesores universitarios y de enseñanza secundaria, ni que actualmente la educación geográfica sea una de sus principales líneas de actividad.La relevante presencia hispana en ambas organizaciones ha contribuido a fomentar esta interacción entre diferentes enfoques de la educación geográfica cuyo subconsciente colectivo reside en los diferentes idiomas vehiculares de la educación, especialmente el inglés y el español, como las principales lenguas nativas globales, junto con el chino.

Climate change education represents a significant challenge for geographical education and educators. While there is a a large body of research focused on students’ alternative conceptions, in contrast there is little attention paid to how teachers construct geographical reasoning about climate change. This study aims to analyse how expert and non-expert teachers articulate geographical thinking in relation to climate change education. An interpretative qualitative design was adopted, based on the analysis of two focus groups differentiated by teaching expertise, conducted in the context of the evaluation and discussion of a teach-er training course on climate change and GIS. Qualitative data were analysed using a combination of deductive categories de-rived from the literature and inductively emerging codes due to the thematic analysis. The results reveal clear differences be-tween the two groups. Expert teachers generate a higher density of qualitative data, mobilise systemic and multiscalar reasoning more consistently, and display explicit strategies of epistemic regulation, particularly through theoretical prudence and evidence-based argumentation. In contrast, non-expert teachers tend to frame complexity as a problem to be reduced, relying more frequently on linear or axiological explanations. Importantly, axiological elements are not absent from expert discourse but coexist in tension with non-axiological approaches.

Collaborative mapping has emerged in recent decades as a key practice for producing open geospatial knowledge and fostering critical citizenship. However, several studies have shown that these platforms may reproduce existing gender inequalities, both in terms of participation and representation. This article examines the potential of collaborative feminist cartography as a strategy for making inequalities visible and promoting gender equality in public space. Methodologically, the study focuses on the project Las Calles de las Mujeres, developed by Geochicas OSM, combining quantitative analysis of street naming in urban development with qualitative implementation in educational contexts. A global overview of 32 cities in 11 countries is provided, with a detailed case study of 11 Spanish cities. Results confirm the persistence of a significant gender gap in urban toponymy: streets named after men not only outnumber those dedicated to women but are also on average longer, more central, and symbolically more prominent. Educational experiences in Spain provide learning outcomes and demonstrate that collaborative mapping strengthens spatial thinking, digital competence, and critical awareness, linking geography education to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG 5 and SDG 11). The article concludes that feminist mapping initiatives are simultaneously pedagogical, social, and political tools, capable of fostering more inclusive and sustainable cities.

The preservation of cultural heritage is a crucial component of sustainable urban and territorial development. This study explores the role of collaborative mapping as both a pedagogical and civic tool for raising awareness about heritage conservation and promoting sustainable spatial citizenship. Using a mixed-methods approach, the study evaluates how students and local communities engage with geospatial technologies to document, assess, and propose solutions for at-risk heritage sites. The research is structured at two different scales: a national study across Spain and a localized case study in Zaragoza. The integration of collaborative mapping in educational settings not only enhances spatial and geographic competencies but also fosters a more critical and participatory approach to urban sustainability. This study demonstrates that digital geolocation tools can be leveraged for active heritage conservation, transforming citizens as agents of change. The results underscore the importance of interdisciplinary methodologies that connect geographic education, heritage studies, and civic engagement for the sustainable management of cultural assets.

Geography education can make use of heritage and socially relevant issues in order to foster geographical and critical thinking and improve social science initial teacher training. This research presents the results of a study that implemented the ArcGIS Survey123 mobile app with a group of 57 Spanish early-childhood education pre-service teachers with the aim of examining their conceptions of heritage and to explore the potential of the use of geolocation tools after an intervention. The study was able to assess prospective teachers’ ability to analyze endangered heritage, while also identifying the typology and spatial distribution of heritage elements all across Spain that they selected and photographed during the intervention. Results also helped understand the way participants assessed the importance of heritage elements and the main arguments that they used, as well as the causes of anthropic deterioration that they identified. Prospective teachers’ opinions regarding the use of this geolocating tool were also addressed. Finally, a discussion about the possibilities and potential of integrating heritage education and geolocation into social science initial teacher training is presented.

This book addresses the advantages of using geospatial information technologies in education for natural and cultural heritage, and sustainable territorial development, as well as the challenges posed by the growing use of artificial intelligence in the face of the necessary deepening of critical, autonomous, and personal thinking by the student. In this way, in addition to this introduction the different authors have chosen fourteen different approaches that aim to enrich the conceptual debate, but also the methodological diversity in the teaching of heritage for its knowledge, conservation, and promotion by future generations.

ArcGIS Dashboard technology allows for the integration and visualization of various maps, charts, and indicators within a single interface, using databases underneath a geographic information system. The two dashboards of the European project Teaching the Future address the dual objective of (i) cartographically displaying the evolution in four phases of climate change data experienced across the entire planet from 1954 to 2021 in vectorial cells measuring one degree of latitude by one degree of longitude and (ii) spatially representing three scenarios (low, medium, and high greenhouse gas emissions) up to the year 2100, showing potential temperature increases in those same cells. In addition to the maps, the different data and charts contribute to the understanding of anomalies relative to the average, the global increase in each selected area by zooming in on the map, and the evolution of both observed and projected data. Both dashboards represent an accurate and reliable treatment of the data, as well as a cartographic expression that is easy for map readers to understand, making them powerful resources for teaching climate change at any educational level, whether in higher education or schools and for a general audience.