THE ROLE 
OF
SPORTS IN GEOGRAPHY
Mark Lamb
Grade Level: Middle School
Geography
PURPOSE:
This project will focus on students' natural interest in professional and amateur sports to motivate them to learn more
about geography in North America specifically, and other continents as well.
CONNECTION TO THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHY STANDARDS:
No. 1 Knows and understands how to use maps, globes and other graphical tools to acquire, process and report information.
The students will use maps to chart and record information about where professional players' hometowns are by
creating a dot density map.
No. 4 Knows and understands the physical and human characteristics of places.
The students will learn how many sports team names and mascots are related to the geography of the region.
No. 6 Knows and understands that culture and experience influence people's perceptions of places and experiences.
The students will look at the similarities and differences in various sports through cultural comparisons,
for example baseball in Japan and Puerto Rico as compared to baseball in the United States.
No. 8 Knows and understands the characteristics and distribution of ecosystems.
The students will look at how the climate and terrain of various geographic regions influence what sporting
activities are present.
OBJECTIVES:
Students will demonstrate there ability:
1. to gather information and to record data.
2. to create maps and locate places on a map.
3. to analyze information and draw conclusions.
4. to describe different physical environments and cultures.
5. to obtain geographic information from the Internet.
OVERVIEW OF PRESENTATION:
This project is designed to teach different factors about geography through the students'
natural interest in sports. Lessons may be done throughout the year to match
whatever sport is in season to enhance excitement and interest (winter and hockey,
summer and baseball, spring and golf, fall and football, etc.) in learning geography.
Different learning instructional activities using small groups, class discussion, research,
and reading aloud will show how various sporting events and sports are affected by culture,
mobility, and physical diversity and how these transcend to relate to location, place, and
movement in geography.
PROCEDURES:
Sponge Activity: Have the students discuss their ideas of what kind of weather they have there?
Opening: Ask the students if they know what the weather is like in other parts of the country?
What are some different types of weather? What is the weather like where their favorite player
is from? Tell them they are going to help create a map consisting of their favorite players
cities and fill in the weather patterns just like the weather person on the television news.
Guided Practice: Draw a map of the U.S. on the bulletin board. Label at least as many cities
on the map as there are students in the class. Additionally, other students should mark on the
map such features as: oceans, mountains, deserts, etc. Once the students have picked out their
favorite player and what team he plays for they should locate that city on the map. Visit the
following web site for in-class discussion: http://the-tech.mit.edu/weather,enter a city name
to get current conditions and forecast.
Independent Practice: Hand out an information sheet to each student which lists information
about each city such as average rain, snow, winds, temperature, etc. Each student should identify
their favorite players team location on their sheet, and put a circle around it. Give each student
small squares of colored construction paper. The students should write the number representing rain
and the word "rain" on the blue square, write the number representing snow and the word "snow" on the
white square, write the number representing temperature and the word "temperature on the
red square, and write the number representing wind and "wind" on the yellow square. The students
need to save these colored squares which contain their data. The weather details of rain, snow,
temperature, and wind will be discussed one day at a time. After each discussion, have students
attach the appropriate square to their favorite ball players appropriate team city.
Evaluation/Assessment/Feedback: The students will demonstrate their ability to learn about climates
in other areas by completing and filling in the bulletin board map.
Closure: Discuss if you wanted to play outdoor ice hockey, what cities might be good to visit?
Where would be a good place to go if you liked wind surfing? If you liked playing baseball in the
rain alot, where should you live? If you liked playing hot sports where would be a good place to go?
If you loved to swim in the ocean, where would be a good place to live? Try and make the connection
between seasons and sports, why we play baseball in summer, and hockey in the winter.
Sponge Activity: Bring a football to the classroom. Discuss the upcoming NFL season and the
students favorite team overall (in our case that's the Dallas Cowboys!). Talk about who the
team plays this year and if they'll make it to the Super Bowl.
Opening: Ask the students if they know how the team gets to each location every Sunday or in
some cases, Monday, for the Monday Night Football game. Do they take a bus, their own vehicle,
taxi, train, or do they fly. Today, they fly by charter airplane in most cases, but our team
will be taking to the bus this season for a grand road trip. They are now in charge of travel
and scheduling for the team. Visit the following web site to get NFL team schedules:
http://www.nando.net/newsroom/sports/fbo/1996/nfl/nfl/stat/97sked.html,
then select your favorite team and go from there.
Guided Practice: Have the students form small groups of 3-5 students. Each group should plan
the road trip between the two cities each week, estimating reasonable, daily travel distances.
For instance, after the first week at Pittsburgh, they don't go back to Dallas first (unless it
was a home game) but instead travel to Arizona. Have the students use a highlighter on the map
to mark the route taken. Have the students create a travel diary that gives an account of the
journey. This diary should tell what they saw on the way and what they did at important sites
in between locations. This should be based on library research, not fictitious.
Independent Practice: Estimate the transportation cost for the trip based upon gas and mileage.
What would be the mileage difference if they flew by plane versus automobile?
To calculate by car use the following Internet web site location:
http://www.mapquest.com/cgi-bin/mqhome, and use the following Internet web site location for
"as the crow flies": http://www.indo.com/distance/
Evaluation/Assessment/Feedback: The students will turn in their road maps for completion and
be checked for proper answers and how they measured distance of the teams upcoming football schedule.
Closure: Talk about how important transportation is in our daily lives and the difference the
changes in transportation have made, not only to a football team arriving rested and relaxed,
but to everyone. Transportation makes our big globe a smaller world when we can get from here
to there in faster ways.
Sponge Activity: Get a compact disc player or audio cassette player and play the song from the
Olympic games held in Atlanta last year performed by Celine Dion called "Power of the Dream."
Have the students pick their favorite Olympic sport.
Opening: Ask if any of the students or anyone they know attended the games in Atlanta or the
Olympic trials here in the US where American athletes qualified to compete on our team. Get
feedback and find out what they know about the Olympics as far as bringing people together from
all over the world (remember, we're ultimately studying geography here, not sports, it's just our
vehicle to gain interest).
Guided Practice:
1. In what country did the Olympic tradition begin?
2. What does the Olympic torch signify?
3. Name 5 cities the torch visited en route?
3. How many different nations competed in Atlanta?
Independent Practice:
1. Find a Web site that features this country and print out a map of this region.
http://www.forthnet.gr/hellas/hellas.html
2. Find a Web site that shows the route for the 1996 Olympic torch relay? Calculate the
distances between cities along the route, in miles and kilometers the torch was carried
and how many miles the torch was carried in our state.
http://www.olympics.nbc.com/torch/index.html, torch relay information
http://www.mapquest.com/cgi-bin/mqhome, mileage distance calculator
http://macke1.com/table, conversion table for miles and kilometers
3. Create an electronic-text travel brochure for the Olympic torch relay by finding five
historic places the torch visited and provide Internet addresses that can bevisited for more information.
http://www.abilene.com/visitors/index.html
http://www.newssource49.com
http://www.knoxnews.com/
http://www.ci.la.ca.us/
http://usacitylink.com/charlotte/see.html
4. Find a Web site featuring some of the world flags.
http://www.pi.net/~marksens/descr/idx-alph.htm
Evaluation/Assessment/Feedback: The students will turn in their answers and web-sites for review.
Closure: Go over the original questions you asked at the beginning of this lesson and refer back to some
of the original answers. This will help the class as they verbalize their new knowledge about the Olympics
compared to what they originally perceived.
Sponge Activity: Bring a baseball to the classroom. Do any of the students participate in baseball
leagues during the summer? Ask students which baseball team is their favorite. Encourage the students
to wear an article of clothing, like a t-shirt or baseball hat, that shows their favorite team. Talk
about how sports are considered part of culture and ask for their comments on the importance of sports
or baseball in the United States.
Opening: Tell students they will be looking at Major League Baseball cards to gather information and
create a map. Distribute all the MLB cards, each student should get at least two, and ask them to look
for and record the hometowns of their players. If the kids or you don't have access to any hard cards
you can obtain the same information at the following web site: http://espnet.sportszone.com/mlb
Guided Practice: Ask each student to report the hometowns of the players. As each town is called out,
students record the town by state and place a mark beside it. Demonstrate this procedure to the students
on the board.
Independent Practice: Students should then pair up and design a dot map on their outline maps, with each
dot marking the location of the hometown of each player. The students will determine their own way to
organize the information, but before the map is complete it must have a title, compass, and key.
Evaluation/Assessment/Feedback: The students will have completed the data gathering and created a dot map.
Closure: When data is gathered and maps are finished, ask students which hometowns and which states had the
highest numbers of players, the least, and have them give their conclusions as to why. Were there any
patterns that occurred showing certain regions to have produced more players? If you wanted to be a major
league baseball player, what are the odds of you making that a reality if you're from Alaska, Pennsylvania, Florida?
Sponge Activity: On a large piece of paper the teacher will create a National Football League playoffs chart.
Discuss how many team names and mascots are related to the geography of the region of the teams participating.
Opening: Write each team's name on a piece of scrap paper. Each student will draw a team "out of the hat", at
random, and this becomes the team they will support (research and learn about specifically) during the NFL playoffs.
Have the students write their name next to their team and return the paper to you. Write the students names next to
their teams on the playoff chart. You will probably have 2-3 students for every team.
Guided Practice: Give each student an index card on which they are to research and record the following information
about their team: NFL team, location, population, team name/mascot, team colors, league and conference, and any
special features of the team. As the games proceed through December and January record the game scores and winners
on the playoff diagram. Information about NFL teams may be found as well at the following web site location:
http://www.nando.net/newsroom/sports/fbo/1996/nfl/
Independent Practice: Students should locate their team on the U.S. map. The name of the team should be written
on a color coded self-adhesive dot (the color corresponds to the league and division to which the team is from)
and placed on the map.
Evaluation/Assessment/Feedback: The students will have completed the research of their NFL team, its location
on the U.S. map, and the handout of all the team names.
Closure: Once they have completed the information required on their index cards, distribute a team names handout. Each
student reports their NFL team name. The class then determines its category and records it on their handout. Discuss
once again how many team names and mascots are related to the geography of the region of the teams that participated.
Were any geographic connections ever drawn to the team names (for example the Dolphins, the Seahawks, the Cowboys)
that were discussed earlier substantiated through our research? The index cards are then posted around a U.S. map
for any students who would like to scout out the upcoming competition. Continue until the end of the Super Bowl
and have a celebration for the student(s) who sponsored the winning team.
Sponge Activity: Bring a golf putter and practice cup into the classroom. Let students take turns attempting to
putt the golf ball into the practice cup on the fake carpet-like surface. While only one student at a time can
be participating in this event, have the class participate in a wide-open discussion of what they know about golf,
its players, etiquette, clothing, equipment, etc. The teacher, if they play golf or even if they don't, but have
access to some golf clothing, may want to dress up the part to bring the subject alive (or just get a head start for
the golf course when school lets out!).
Opening: Spend a few minutes discussing where you can play golf locally, in your region, in your state, and nationally.
Ask the students if any of them have ever played golf. They might be more familiar with miniature golf, and that's all
right as well, we're just trying to discover what they know about where golf is played.
Guided Practice: Have some newspapers available with the sporting sections and have the students research and cut
out any articles that have to do with the sport of golf. You may also have them look through various magazines and
catalogs that discuss golf or have pictures of golf apparel or equipment. These instructional activities will
help students learn about the area and origin through this collection of stories and advertisements. At a
web-site providing the schedule of the Professional Golf Association tour have the students outline the physical
location of their favorite site from the 1997 scheduled tour. The 1997 PGA scheduled tour can be found at the
following web site: http://www.golfweb.com/ga97/pga/sched.html, locations of all the tournament events and current
or defending champions are listed here.
Independent Practice: The students should find the hometown newspaper of the PGA tournament location they selected.
Go to the story from last years winner and describe any of the geographic conditions (for instance, sunny, windy,
what kind of terrain, rainy) from that particular article. Use the following web site location to obtain newspapers
on-line: http://www.newslink.org/news.html, pick out a paper from the tournaments location. Also find out who won
the tournament last year and where was that player from? How far was it from their home to the tournament by car,
by plane? To calculate by car use the following Internet web site location: http://www.mapquest.com/cgi-bin/mqhome,
and use the following Internet web site location for "as the crow flies": http://www.indo.com/distance/
A round of miniature golf donated from a local business to the individual student that matches the donors favorite
tournament would be nice.
Evaluation/Assessment/Feedback: The students will have completed the gathering of a PGA tour location newspaper
and completed their mileage assignment for the last years winner.
Closure: Talk about how different transportation is important in our society in relation to the mileage a PGA
player could put on their car. Distinguish how different newspapers from different parts of the countries report
the same identical events but in vastly, different ways.
Sponge Activity: Bring an exercise bicycle to school. Demonstrate that riding a bicycle is enjoyable,
except when you have to go uphill (do this by increasing the tension on the bike, not by placing it in an
upward slant for safety sake). Discuss bicycling and whether or not the students have bicycles. Most ride
them for relaxation and transportation, however, find out if anyone knows of people who ride them competitively
in their town, like a triathlon or marathon race. In Europe they have a sport of cycling where riders use them
for competition, with the most famous race being the Tour de France.
Opening: Read a section feature story from Bicycling Magazine about the 1997 Tour de France. Ask students if
any of them have ever heard of these locations. The places for the most part will be unfamiliar to the students,
but hopefully they will be more knowledgeable after the lesson or unit is completed.
Guided Practice: Have each student be responsible for a stage of the course. They are responsible for knowing
the mileage of their particular stage and must convert the kilometer length to mileage terms. Discuss metric
system of measurements vs. what our country uses and the differences. A conversion web site is at the
following location: http://macke1.com/table
Independent Practice: Each student is responsible for acting as a local tour guide for foreigners who are
visiting to be spectators at the race. Help identify some of the highlights of that area and places we wouldn't
want to miss out on while we are there in that part of the country. A good Internet web site location can be
found at the following: http://www.webfoot.com/travel/guides/france/france.html
Describe the weather conditions currently at your stage of the race. You can find weather information about
France at the following web site location: http://rs560.cl.msu.edu/weather/eurir.jpg
My U.S. travel agent told me not to come to France because the French people don't like Americans and there is
alot of terrorism. Are there any advisories from our government that can verify this information? You can find
this information at the following Internet location:
gopher://gopher.stolaf.edu/00/internet%20resources/US-State-Department-Travel-Advisories
Evaluation/Assessment/Feedback: The student will demonstrate a stronger knowledge about particular regions of
France and have participated in class discussion about the metric system. The student will also have visited
some web sites to validate their responses to questions that were given.
Closure: Possibly have a French language teacher speak to our class about any of the other differences between
our culture and France. Discuss how other sports are dominant in Europe but lack the popularity in North America.
You might consider having a local travel agent who has traveled to France come to the class and discuss their trip,
travel advisories, passport information, etc.
MATERIALS:
Major League Baseball cards (at least 100)
wall map of the United States
road atlases and U.S. maps for students
outlined maps of the U.S. duplicated on both sides of handout for students
colored pencils or highlighters
large paper and markers
scrap paper
catalogs
colored dots
index cards
computer with Internet accessibility
weather labels for sun, oceans, mountains, deserts
information sheet containing average rain, snow, winds, temperature, etc.
colored construction paper
scissors and scotch tape or some type of adhesive
football, baseball, exercise bike, golf ball, putter, putting surface, baseball hat or t-shirt
pictures of planes, trains, automobiles, bus, taxi
compact disc player and cd containing song "Power of the Dream"
Olympic torch, either a picture or make one
newspapers, magazines, and catalogs
EXTENSIONS:
-Ask a meteorologist from the local television station or National Weather Service or military services
to talk to the class about the weather and why it is important in our lives. Have them explain how they
depict geographic features such as bodies of water, mountains or cities?
-Have the students create a written set of instructions so that someone could follow them on their own map
of the area.
-Discuss women in sports and equality of opportunity. How does the economics of equal opportunity relate to
the fiscal responsibility, i.e. mens college football generally funds all other sports at the university level.
Find out more about the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League.
-Look at the history of sports. Discuss baseball as a representative of societal value and how it has dealt
with race and cultural themes. How have the Nike commercials featuring Tiger Woods dealt with race relations
in the sport of golf? Read excerpt from the book "In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson" by Bette Bao Lord.
-Look at the Olympics and history. The economic impact of the Olympic games on Atlanta.
-Baseball has been called America's favorite pastime. Have students make an argument for their favorite sport.
-Design a stamp celebrating a favorite sports hero, team, or sport.
-Discuss the basic food groups and why health and physical regimen are important to athletes. Calculate the
number of calories burned in training for a particular sport.
-Have students choose the site of the next expansion team in a pro sport giving population, geographic, political
and economic reasons for the location. They can design the team's mascot and logo.
-Do sports teams generate income for a community? How? Do the teams bring recognition and a sense of belonging
to the community? What special plans must be made to accommodate game day?
-Poll other teachers about where they went to school or college and what sports did they participate in at the time?
Post a list for students to see.
-Write poetry about their favorite sport, team, or player. Write a letter to their favorite player asking them about
their travels as an athlete and how geography is important.
-Make a map showing the sites of the various holiday bowl games for college football teams. Use a newspaper weather
map section, have students try to predict weather conditions for various game locations, to determine which teams
will experience rain on.
-Ask a speaker from the local planning office to talk to the class about how engineers plan cities to meet people's
needs now and in the future. What events or people influenced your town's development? What landmarks or roads
were named after historical figures or famous events in the past?
-Study a professionally drawn map of your area. Compare and contrast the natural and human-built resources.
Note the way maps show different terrain and landmarks.
APPENDIX:
All charts, maps, handouts, and worksheet data can be obtained at the web sites listed throughout the lessons.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Bale, John. Sports Geography. New York: E. & F. N. Spon, 1989.
Kansas City Star/Times. "Newspapers, Football & Geography." ERIC Digest No. 300317, Kansas City Star/Times, MO. Educational Services Department, 1985.
Mrozek, Donald J. Sport and American Mentality. University of Tennessee Press, 1983.
Porter, A.P. Greg Lemond, Premier Cyclist. Minneapolis: Lerner Publication Co., 1990.
Riffenberg, Bean. NFL's Official History of Pro Football. Avenal, New Jersey: Outlet Book Co., Inc., 1990.
Rooney, John F., Jr. A Geography of American Sport. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley,1974.
Schlene, Vickie J. "Sport in History." ERIC Journal No. 463212, OAH Magazine of History; v.7, n1, p69-70, Summer 1992.
Stout, Peg. Alaska Women in the Iditarod. ERIC Digest No. 347015, Alaska State Department of Education, Juneau. Division of Educational Program Support,
1992.
USA Today: Sports Atlas. New York: H.M. Gousah, Simon & Schuster, 1991.
Wallechinsky, David. The Complete Book of the Olympics. Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1991.
BIBLIOGRAPHY OF INTERNET SITES:
Please note that all internet sites were current as of April 7, 1997 as I personally bookmarked each website location.
Abilene Convention & Visitors Bureau Homepage, Abilene, Texas, at:
http://www.abilene.com/visitors/index.html
AJR Newslink, an on-line list of available electronically published newspapers, at:
http://www.newslink.org/news.html
Charlotte, North Carolina - What to See, at:
http://usacitylink.com/charlotte/see.html
ESPNet SportZone, Major League Baseball, at:
http://espnet.sportszone.com/mlb
Flags of the 19th & 20th Centuries, an alphabetic index, at:
http://www.pi.net/~marksens/descr/idx-alph.htm
GolfWeb, Golf Action 1997, PGA Tour, 1997 Schedule, at:
http://www.golfweb.com/ga97/pga/sched.html
HELLAS Map, homepage of Hellas, at:
http://www.forthnet.gr/hellas/hellas.html
How Far Is It?, home of the distance service, at:
http://www.indo.com/distance/
Index of National Football League Teams & Information, at:
http://www.nando.net/newsroom/sports/fbo/1996/nfl/
Macke, The Laundry & Water Service Leader, conversions, at:
http://macke1.com/table
MapQuest! Welcome Page, at:
http://www.mapquest.com/cgi-bin/mqhome
1997 National Football League Team Schedules, at:
http://www.nando.net/newsroom/sports/fbo/1996/nfl/nfl/stat/97sked.html
Olympic Torch Relay Run, at:
http://www.olympics.nbc.com/torch/index.html
The Knoxville News-Sentinel Online Homepage, Knoxville, Tennesee, at:
http://www.knoxnews.com/
The Lighthouse, on-line weather information, at:
http://the-tech.mit.edu/weather
The Webfoot's Guide to France, at:
http://www.webfoot.com/travel/guides/france/france.html
TV Newssource 49 On-line Hompage, Topeka, Kansas, at:
http://www.newssource49.com
United States State Department Travel Advisories, at:
gopher://gopher.stolaf.edu/00/internet%20resources/US-State-Department-Travel-Advisories
Weather images from Europe, at:
http://rs560.cl.msu.edu/weather/eurir.jpg
Welcome to the City of Los Angeles, official site of Los Angeles City Government, at:
http://www.ci.la.ca.us/
Created April 23, 1997
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