MVMS Students Compete in Geography Bee
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A select group of Mountain Valley Middle School students is competing online this week to win Comal ISD’s 2nd Annual Geography Bee.
This isn’t like a traditional spelling bee — they’re seated in front of computers at their Canyon Lake school, working diligently to answer questions like:
- “The Danube River flows through the cities of Vienna and Budapest on which continent?”
- “Which state has a longer coastline? A. Maine or B. Rhode Island?
- “Nine Yankee baseball stadiums could fit inside the Mall of the Americas. The Mall of the America is just south of Minneapolis in which state that borders Wisconsin?
If they prevail against 60 other Comal ISD middle-schoolers taking the same test at other campuses, they’ll head to the state GeoBee on March 29. Sponsored by the National Geographic Society, the GeoBee, as it is known, was developed in 1989 in response to concern about the lack of geographic knowledge among young people in the United States.
Patricia Nieto, Comal ISD’s social studies/world languages curriculum coordinator, said students earned their spot on MVMS’ team by taking a district qualifying test. Questions cover geography, cultures, physical features, history and earth science.
“We began the Geography Bee last year to spark interest and motivate students to learn more about the world,” Nieto said. “Currently, all students in Grade 6 World Cultures classrooms are given the district qualifying test to determine the top 10 performing students to compete at the Campus Geography Bee.”
“Middle school students are still forming their worldview and studying geography provides a contextual foundation for learning about their world through their social studies class and also through connections with other classrooms,” she said.
The competition includes a final and championship round with a “spelling bee” format. The final round comes down to two competitors who square off with a clean slate in the championship round. The championship round determines the one student who will take the online qualifying test to compete for the Texas Geography Bee.
