Thanks for posting a more intellectually honest syllabus for a geography class.
Those of you who are not in public education need to understand that one of the fundamental attacks on traditional teaching and learning is the assault on subject matter itself.
The idea that, within a given academic discipline, there is a universally recognized body of knowledge that must be mastered is the "authority" that is continually being "questioned."
Hence, geography need not include geography. It, instead, can be the launching point for the discussion of a hundred seeming unrelated (and often more interesting and less intellectually demanding) topics.
The comparison between a real geography syllabus and Mr. Bennish's syllabus reveals what is happening in all academic subjects in public schools.
Thanks, and to be honest NCEA is already affacted by the postmodern theories of education that the modern Left is so fond of. My alma matar is so unhappy with the whole concept of standards-based education and "skills-based" learning that it single-handedly introduced Cambridge University's international exams to New Zealand's schools.
You can notice that the first syllabus is more hard-knowledge-and-skills-based, while the second one starts to look more Bennishized.