ABSTRACT
Students of geography, environmental sciences and history all seek to understand visible landscapes, as do tourists at heritage sites and visitors to unfamiliar cities. A school nature walk or a visit to a playground garden involves learning about the surroundings. Children in a school garden look for signs of growth after winter. Visitors explore an historic city, taking in the atmosphere of the narrow streets. All these people are learning about their immediate environment. Geo-learning can take place in cities as well as in the countryside. Some cities provide audio guides for walking tours. The textopia application takes the urban tour a step further by offering literary texts and poetry that reveal hidden stories and personal experiences about the locations. An urban geographer will recognize cultural signs of fashion and taste. A pedagogy of geo-learning can help students to read their surroundings, with a teacher or technology guiding them in the skills of interpretation.
