"Geology"

Amy brings up how much she enjoys "geology" class. After describing how much she understands about where countries are, I correct her and say that she enjoys "geography." She brushes off the correction and begins to say some very inaccurate statements regarding geography. I decided to ask her to draw me a map of the world. The end result was this:

Here are the highlights of the progression:

She began with North America. After drawing the rough outline, she started Canada. Since we do live here, she got a good portion of that correct. Then she moved on to the USA. After jotting in Tennessee, Texas (pronounced "Texix), LA, and Pittsburgh, she drew Europe and placed London, Paris, and the UK.

Next was Australia and New Zealand. For some reason she placed Burnaby there instead of in British Columbia. Why Burnaby? Beats me.

Now, at this point, she drew a blank. I urged her on to try and name all the continents. She said she didn't know. I asked her how many continents there were. She replied with, "Well, more than this...TWENTY-SEVEN!"

I decided to have her fill out the US a bit more. I asked her where New York was. She said, "it's in L.A." Just before she drew a dot for it, she corrected herself with, "No! Wait! It's attached to L.A.! I don't know if it's on top or underneath, though, so I'm just going to draw it here."

She suddenly remembered Florida. She drew it on the west coast before scratching it out and placing it on an island. Also, Florida and Alaska are two terms for the same place, she said.

 I asked her about Asia, and she said, "Oh, yeah. Somewhere under Europe here. It's not that big, though, 'cause not many people live there." (???)

Then I said, "If we live in North America, isn't there a similar continent somewhere?" She didn't understad my hint, so I said, "Ok, where's South America?" She drew the land mass below North America, then an epiphany hit her: "THAT'S WHERE AFRICA IS! I CAN'T BELIEVE I FORGOT ABOUT AFRICA!"

I asked about Antarctica. She said, "don't we live in Antarctica?" and shaded in the southern Canadian prairies. She thought for a second, and said, "No, it's probably higher up over here."

Around this point, I asked, "Is there any other places in the world?"

Amy replied, "No, these are all the places people live or visit."

She spent a couple more minutes writing in a few other places before stopping.