Sense of Place
Sense of Place Inquiry
1. Trace the water you drink from precipitation to tap.
2. What is the composition of the soil you are standing on?
3. What was the total rainfall/snowfall in your area last year?
4. Name five common plants in your area. Are any of them native?
5. When was the last time a fire burned in your area?
6. What culture(s) lived in your area before you?
7. Name 5 edible plants in your region and their season(s) of availability.
8. From what direction do winter storms generally come in your region?
9. What process(es) does your community use to make decisions?
10. Name five resident and five migratory birds in your area.
11. Where does your garbage go?
12. How long is the growing season where you live?
13. On what day of the year are the shadows the shortest where you live?
14. Name five elected officials or civic leaders in your community.
15. What is the land use history of where you live?
16. How many people in your community have adequate nutrition? Access to health care? A college degree?
17. What primary ecological event/process influenced the land form where you live? (Bonus: what's the evidence?)
18. What primary historical event/process influenced the community where you live? (Bonus: what’s the evidence?)
19. Name five countries that people in your community have emigrated from.
20. What species have become extinct in your area?
21. What are the major plant communities in your region?
22. From where you're reading this, point north.
23. What spring wildflower is consistently among the first to bloom where you live?
24. What is the biggest employer in your community?
25. What legends, folk tales, or stories are told of your region?
1. Trace the water you drink from precipitation to tap.
2. What is the composition of the soil you are standing on?
3. What was the total rainfall/snowfall in your area last year?
4. Name five common plants in your area. Are any of them native?
5. When was the last time a fire burned in your area?
6. What culture(s) lived in your area before you?
7. Name 5 edible plants in your region and their season(s) of availability.
8. From what direction do winter storms generally come in your region?
9. What process(es) does your community use to make decisions?
10. Name five resident and five migratory birds in your area.
11. Where does your garbage go?
12. How long is the growing season where you live?
13. On what day of the year are the shadows the shortest where you live?
14. Name five elected officials or civic leaders in your community.
15. What is the land use history of where you live?
16. How many people in your community have adequate nutrition? Access to health care? A college degree?
17. What primary ecological event/process influenced the land form where you live? (Bonus: what's the evidence?)
18. What primary historical event/process influenced the community where you live? (Bonus: what’s the evidence?)
19. Name five countries that people in your community have emigrated from.
20. What species have become extinct in your area?
21. What are the major plant communities in your region?
22. From where you're reading this, point north.
23. What spring wildflower is consistently among the first to bloom where you live?
24. What is the biggest employer in your community?
25. What legends, folk tales, or stories are told of your region?
Adapted from: “Where You At? A Bioregional Quiz,” Leonard Charles, Jim Dodge, Lynn Milliman, and Victoria Stockley, Coevolution Quarterly 32 (Winter 1981): 1.