Abstract
AbstractDigital Earth (DE) education provides students with geospatial knowledge and skills to locate, measure, and solve geographic problems on Earth’s surface. The rapid development of geospatial technology has promoted a new vision of DE to embrace data infrastructure, social networks, citizen science, and human processes on Earth. The high demand for a geospatial workforce also calls for an ever-changing, diverse form of learning experiences. Limited efforts, however, have been made regarding DE education to adapt to this changing landscape, with most interventions falling short of expectations. This chapter gives an overview of current teaching and learning structures with DE technologies. Successes and obstacles for K-12 education are explored first, followed by classroom technologies and experiential learning and outreach exercises such as academic certificates and internships in higher education. Taking the geospatial intelligence model from the U.S. Geospatial Intelligence Foundation (USGIF) as an example, recent advancements in DE education for professional careers are described via its geospatial competencies, hierarchical frameworks, and credentials. In alignment with the principles of DE development, future DE education calls for an integrated learning framework of open data, real-world context, and virtual reality for better preparedness of our students in the geospatial world.
Highlights
The vision of Digital Earth (DE), initially presented by former U
As presented by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), education fulfils its valuable role of providing foundational knowledge and skills, engaging critical thinking, and building students positive attitudes to become active participants in a world characterized by diversity and pluralism (UNESCO 2018)
As early as 1999, Lucia and Lepsinger (1999) offered this definition of a competency: “... a cluster of related knowledge, skills, and attitudes that affects a major part of one’s job, that correlates with performance on the job, that can be measured against well-accepted standards, and that can be improved via training and development.”
Summary
The vision of Digital Earth (DE), initially presented by former U. In the Big Data era, new visions for DE are emerging to take into account the developments in web-enabled sensors and opportunities provided by social networks and citizencontributed information. Data infrastructures and Earth observations, and the scientific and societal drivers for the next-generation of DE have been highlighted in recent literature (e.g., Craglia et al 2012; Goodchild et al 2012; Guo et al 2017). The descriptor of user(s) is generically defined or refers to, at best, a few professional organizations. Nowhere in this particular vision of users does the learner appear even though education has caught the attention of DE proponents in the past (Kerski 2008; Donert 2015). K-12 successes and obstacles are identified first, followed by higher education, professional credentialing opportunities, and the future of DE education and professional development
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
