Experience with the GIS Mobility Project at KOGEKA: An Example of Co-operation between Primary and Secondary Schools on School Mobility and Traffic Safety. GI_Forum 2013 – Creating the GISociety|

Abstract

The opportunities for using GIS in schools are numerous. KOGEKA, a community of six secondary schools in Belgium, has been working with GIS for about 10 years now and is running a GIS Mobility project in some of their schools. In this project the secondary school pupils work together with pupils from primary schools in the neighbourhood, on school mobility and traffic safety. This paper reports about KOGEKA’s experiences with the GIS mobility project and describes (i) the added value that the use of GIS can offer in a project like this, (ii) how GIS can support the development of spatial thinking in pupils, (iii) what potential this kind of projects can have to contribute to achieve learning objectives described in curricula and (iv) how the project encourages pupils take up their role as active citizens. We conclude with some general thoughts to consider for schools that think of running similar projects