Top tips for preparing for the

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Top tips for preparing for the
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National Geographic Bee
By Neeraj Sirdeshmukh 2nd place winner in 2006
National Geo Bee
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TIP 1 LOCATIONS
Learning geography starts with the basic tool,
the atlas. Familiarize yourself with the major
cities, countries, provinces/territories, and
other physical and political divisions of our
planet.
A good atlas is Geographica. Another one is
National Geographic Family Atlas of the World.
A free world atlas can be found online at
www.encarta.msn.com. Go to www.geography.about.co
m to find blank maps of every county.
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Identify what location is represented by each
symbol on the blank map
This port city was founded in 1177 when a castle
over the Lagan River was built. ANSWER Belfast,
United Kingdom What river is this? ANSWER Rhine
River This is the second largest city in Germany
and is located on the Elbe River. ANSWER
Hamburg, Germany This is the southernmost point
of mainland Europe. What is it called? ANSWER
Point Tarifa, Spain
The best way to memorize locations is to practice
filling in blank maps.
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TIP 2 CURRENT EVENTS

• Keep up with world news every day to know whats
  happening around the world.
• All current events questions ask about events
  that happened up to 1 year before the national
  bee.
• Global news is more important than
• United States news for the Bee. Most current
  events questions will have a geographic clue.
  Others might not.
• For example, a question might look like
• On January 2, 2009, the army of which country
  announced that it had captured Kilinochchi, the
  capital city of the Tamil Tiger rebels?
• ANSWER
• One of the best websites for global news
• coverage is www.bbcnews.com.

SRI LANKA
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TIP 3 CAPITAL CITIES

• Memorize the capital of every country in the
  world. Making flash cards is a great way to do
  this.
• Lets see how much you already know. Here is a
  short quiz
• What is the capital of

ARGENTINA?
Buenos Aires
RWANDA?
Kigali
SIERRA LEONE?
Freetown
MALDIVES?
Male
MALAYSIA?
Kuala Lumpur
BURKINA FASO?
Ouagadougou
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TIP 4 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY

• Learn physical geography terms through a good
  reference book or encyclopedia. I used the
  National Geographic Desk Reference. Again,
  making flash cards is a good way to memorize
  terms.

Physical geography questions ask mostly about key
terms, such as barchan, cirque, moraine, abyssal
plain, tarn, and esker. These terms relate to
mostly the following topics world climates,
soils, wind and ocean current patterns, glaciers,
dunes, rocks and minerals, the ocean floor,
rivers, lakes, etc..
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CLIMATE GRAPHS
These types of questions pop up occasionally and
require you to analyze a climate graph, a chart
that shows temperature and precipitation patterns
for a particular location. You are given a few
cities and asked to find the one that best fits
the graph. For example, look at this graph. The
red line represents the temperature in degrees
Celsius. You can tell that it is hot year round-
around 28 degrees C. There are no extremes in
temperature. This should immediately tell you
that this city is close to the equator. The blue
bars represent precipitation. It is very wet. The
highest amount of precipitation occurs from
November-January. If you know that the northeast
monsoon winds blow during this period, you can
tell that this city is located somewhere in
southern Asia. SO WHAT CITY IS IT ????
What city matches this climagraph?
A) Rio de Janeiro B) Stockholm C)
Washington, D.C. D) Singapore E) Sydney ANSWER
Singapore
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TIP 5 STUDY REGULARLY
Dont forget to study regularly. Utilize any free
time you have. Use your weekends, after-school
free time and vacations fruitfully. Its up to
you to decide how much you should study.
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TIP 6 GEOGRAPHY IS A BROAD SUBJECT. SO WHAT DO
YOU REALLY NEED TO KNOW?

• To give you an idea of how big geography really
  is, here are some of the different parts of
  geography
• Political geography
• Physical geography
• Economic geography
• Historical geography
• Cultural (human) geography
• Travel/tourism
• There are many other parts.. But for the Bee,
  these six are the ones you should be familiar
  with..

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What do you need to know about each part of
geography?

• POLITICAL Countries, capitals, major cities,
  autonomous regions, overseas territories/dependenc
  ies, bordering countries, international
  organizations (like OPEC, NATO), flags of major
  countries
• PHYSICAL other than what we discussed earlier,
  physical geo also includes where physical
  features, such as rivers, lakes, mountains,
  deserts, plateaus, basins, bays, seas, gulfs,
  etc.. are located.
• ECONOMIC major exports, currencies, natural
  resources, mining and industrial regions (like
  the Donets Basin in Ukraine)
• HISTORICAL former names of countries and
  territories, independence, ancient civilizations
  and their geographic extent, empires (like the
  Ottoman, Roman, and Mongol empires)
• CULTURAL(HUMAN) Religions, languages, and ethnic
  groups of each country. Also population pyramids.
• TRAVEL major and (a few) minor attractions, like
  the Iguazu Falls, Santorini, Hagia Sophia,
  Harbour Bridge, Guilin, Valley of the Kings,
  etc.

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Other points

• Learn to interpret climate graphs, population
  pyramids, and contour maps. For help with climate
  graphs, look at the climate graphs slide.
  Population pyramids show the population
  distribution of a country according to gender and
  age groups. Contour maps have contour lines on
  them that connect points of equal elevation.
• For odd man out, the most common questions deal
  with locations and physical geography. For
  example, you may be asked, What is the odd man
  out? and given these choices Angola, Cape
  Verde, Sao Tome and Principe, Namibia, and Guinea
  Bissau. The answer is Namibia because it is the
  only country that did not achieve independence
  from Portugal out of the five countries. Namibia
  got its independence from South Africa.

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QUIZ

• 1. POLITICAL Abkhazia, Ajaria, and South Ossetia
  are three autonomous republics that have been
  seeking independence from which country?
• ANSWER Georgia
• 2. PHYSICAL What is the term for a volcanic
  crack in the ground through which steam and gases
  escape?
• ANSWER fumarole

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QUIZ (Continued)

• 3. ECONOMIC The Darling Downs is a farming
  region centered around the city of Toowoomba, in
  which country?
• ANSWER Australia
• 4. HISTORICAL Which city was once known as
  Petrograd and later as Leningrad?
• ANSWER Saint Petersburg, Russia

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QUIZ (Continued)

• 5. CULTURAL(HUMAN) Which country has more
  Muslims than any other country in the world?
• ANSWER Indonesia
• 6. TRAVEL/TOURISM The Buddhas of Bamiyan, now a
  UNESCO World Heritage Site, were destroyed by the
  Taliban in 2001. This event occurred in which
  country?
• ANSWER Afghanistan

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TIP 7 EARTHS EXTREMES

• Know Earths extremes- its highest, lowest,
  deepest, largest, smallest, most populous, least
  populous, longest, shortest, hottest, coldest,
  wettest, most visited, tallest, etc physical
  and/or political features. Making flash cards is
  again a great way to memorize extremes.
• Questions on Earths extremes and odd man out
• What is the deepest lake in the world?
• ANSWER Lake Baikal, Russia
• 2) Where was the hottest temperature on Earth
  ever recorded?
• ANSWER El Azizia, Libya
• 3) Odd man out abyssal plain, continental shelf,
  alluvial fan, trench, continental slope
• ANSWER Alluvial fan (it is a river feature, not
  an ocean floor one)

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TIP 8 CREATE YOUR OWN CHART
When I was studying, I created my own chart,
filled with all the facts I needed to know about
every country. Using a chart to memorize is much
easier than just reading a book with facts. I
made columns for the following country name,
capital, major cities, highest points, physical
features, independence, religions, languages,
ethnic groups, maps, bordering countries,
currencies, major exports, and facts. My table
looked like this
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TIP 9 PLAY QUIZZES TO TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE
Playing quizzes is a great way to prepare,
especially if you have limited time to study.
Good websites www.mygeotrivia.com- thousands
of questions (you can also view a sample of the
chart I created here) www.geography.about.com- go
to Test your Knowledge www.nationalgeographic.c
om/geobee/- new Geo Bee Challenge every
day www.epals.com go to Geography
Central www.hillmanwonders.com- top 100 wonders
of the world
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TIP 10 PARTICIPATE IN GEOGRAPHY DISCUSSION
FORUMS
One great discussion forum is www.geobeecentral.co
m , where you can keep in touch with many other
geography bee contestants and fans like you..
There are also quiz questions, more advice on
how to prepare, and other tips. Another one is
www.epals.com. There is a blog called Geography
Central.
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Thank You

• and
• GOOD LUCK !
• If you have any questions or comments, please
  email them to info_at_myGeoTrivia.com