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Lesson 2 of 4Geographic Thinking & Skills
Unit 1 · Lesson 2 of 4

Geographic Inquiry and Evaluating Sources

The five steps of the geographic inquiry process, the different types of inquiry questions, primary and secondary sources (including First Nations, Métis and Inuit knowledge and maps), how to judge credibility and bias across print, online and social media, how to spot AI-generated content, and how to document your sources.

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Key things to remember

  1. 1The geographic inquiry process: formulate questions, gather and organize, interpret and analyse, evaluate and draw conclusions, communicate.
  2. 2Question types: factual, comparative, causal, predictive and evaluative (judgement). Strong inquiry questions are open, researchable and focused.
  3. 3Primary sources are first-hand (field notes, interviews, satellite images, oral histories); secondary sources interpret or summarize others' evidence.
  4. 4Judge credibility by checking author, date, purpose, evidence, corroboration and bias.
  5. 5To check AI-generated or manipulated content, look for visual or factual errors, reverse-search images, and confirm the source, date and author with a trusted second source.

A dramatic photo is spreading online: a river has burst its banks and water is pouring through city streets. The caption says it happened this morning in a town near you. Should you share it? Is it real, is it recent, is it even the right place? Geographers face this problem constantly. Answering geographic questions well means asking good questions, finding evidence from many kinds of sources and checking that evidence before you trust it. That process is called geographic inquiry.

The geographic inquiry process

1Formulate questionsWhat do you want to know?2Gather and organizemaps, data, field notes3Interpret and analysefind patterns and links4Evaluate and concludeanswer with evidence5Communicateshare maps and reportsCheck every sourceWho made it, and why?Is it credible? Is it biased?Was it AI-generated? Verifyit with a second source.Communicating often raises new questions, so the cycle starts again.
Fig 1The geographic inquiry process as a cycle of five steps: formulate questions, gather and organize information, interpret and analyse, evaluate and draw conclusions, and communicate. At the centre, a reminder to check every source at every step: who made it and why, is it credible or biased, was it AI-generated, and can a second source confirm it. Communicating often raises new questions, so the cycle starts again.
Type of questionWhat it asksExample
FactualWhat, where, when or how much? It has a clear answer you can look up.How many people live in Thunder Bay?
ComparativeHow are two or more places or things alike or different?How does the climate of Vancouver differ from that of Winnipeg?
CausalWhy did it happen? What caused it, and what are its effects?Why do so many newcomers to Canada settle in large cities?
PredictiveWhat might happen in the future if a trend continues?How might warmer winters change ice roads in northern Ontario by 2050?
Evaluative (judgement)Which option is best, or how successful is something? It needs criteria and evidence.Is building homes on farmland the best way to deal with a housing shortage?
Types of inquiry questions. Strong investigations usually start from causal, predictive or evaluative questions.
What makes a strong inquiry question
A strong question is open (it cannot be answered with yes, no or one number), researchable (evidence exists), focused on a place and scale ("in Ontario", "in my neighbourhood") and worth arguing about. Compare "What is a flood?" with "How well is my town prepared for a 100-year flood?" The second one needs maps, data and judgement.

Primary and secondary sources

APrimary sources (first-hand)
  • Your own field observations, photos, sketches and measurements
  • Surveys and interviews you carry out
  • Satellite and aerial images
  • Oral histories shared by Elders and Knowledge Keepers
  • Original maps, diaries, letters and government records from the time
BSecondary sources (interpret or summarize)
  • News articles and documentaries about an issue
  • Encyclopedia and website articles
  • Reports that analyse data someone else collected
  • Graphs and maps made from other people's data
  • Podcasts and videos that explain a topic

Good inquiry also uses diverse perspectives. First Nations, Métis and Inuit knowledge of the land, often passed on orally over many generations, is evidence in its own right: it can record how animal migrations, ice conditions or river levels have changed. Indigenous place names are a starting point: "Canada" likely comes from the Huron-Iroquois word kanata, meaning village or settlement; "Toronto" is usually traced to the Mohawk tkaronto, a place where trees stand in the water; Iqaluit means "place of many fish" in Inuktitut. The website Native Land Digital (native-land.ca) maps Indigenous territories, languages and treaties and is a helpful place to start, but it states clearly that it is not an official or legal map. Territories overlap and change over time, so the best source is the Nation itself.

Credibility and bias

  1. Author: Who made it? Do they have expertise (a scientist, government agency, Knowledge Keeper, journalist)? An anonymous account is a warning sign.
  2. Date: When was it made or last updated? Data from 2006 may not describe a place today.
  3. Purpose: Is it trying to inform, persuade, sell or entertain? An advertisement from a company that profits from a project has a reason to show only the benefits.
  4. Evidence: Does it give data, maps or sources you can check, or only opinions and emotional language?
  5. Corroboration: Do other independent, trustworthy sources say the same thing? Open new tabs and check what others say about the source itself (this is called lateral reading).
  6. Bias: Does it leave out other perspectives, use loaded words ("disaster", "job-killing") or show only one side? Every source has a point of view; it becomes biased when it distorts or hides evidence.
Spotting AI-generated and manipulated content
AI tools can make realistic images, video, voices and text in seconds. For images, look for warped hands or faces, garbled signs and text, impossible shadows or reflections, and backgrounds that melt together, then do a reverse image search to find where the picture first appeared. For text, be careful with confident claims that cite no sources, or cite studies and links that do not exist. AI chatbots can invent facts that sound real. No single clue proves anything (and AI detectors make mistakes), so always go back to the source, date, author and evidence, and confirm with a trusted second source.

Organizing, communicating and documenting

Organize what you gather as you go: notes sorted by sub-question, tables of data, and a running list of sources. When you communicate, match the format to your audience: a map, infographic, report, slide presentation, podcast or letter to a city council. Use geographic terms accurately (say "population density" rather than "how crowded"). Every map, graph and fact you borrow needs documentation: a citation that gives the author, date, title, publisher or website, and the link. Use one accepted style, such as APA or MLA, consistently. When you use knowledge shared by an Elder or Knowledge Keeper, ask their permission, and name them, their Nation or community, and the date in your citation.

You will use this process throughout the course: investigating why a natural hazard hits some places harder (Unit 2), weighing evidence about a resource project (Unit 3), analysing census data on immigration (Unit 4) and proposing a plan to make your community more liveable (Unit 5).

Worked examples

Reveal one step at a time and try to beat it to the next line.

Example 1
Turn the topic "flooding" into a strong inquiry question for a study of a community in Ontario.
Example 2
A social media post shows a photo of downtown streets under water with the caption "Calgary RIGHT NOW!!" Explain how you would check it before sharing.
Example 3
You find two sources about a proposed pipeline: an advertisement from the company building it, and a fundraising page from an environmental group that opposes it. How should you use them?

Where marks get lost

  • Treating anything on a polished website as reliable. Design does not equal credibility; check the author, purpose and evidence.
  • Throwing out a biased source completely. A biased source can still show a real perspective; just do not treat it as neutral fact.
  • Asking a closed question ("Is Toronto big?") as an inquiry question. Inquiry questions are open and need evidence and analysis.
  • Believing an AI chatbot's answer or references without checking. AI can invent statistics, quotes and sources that do not exist.
  • Using an online map of Indigenous territories as if it were an official legal boundary. Maps like Native Land Digital are starting points; the Nations themselves are the authority.

Flashcards 8

Geographic inquiry process
Primary source
Secondary source
Credibility
+ 4 more

Practice

1
Put the steps of the geographic inquiry process in order.
  1. 1Communicate the results
  2. 2Evaluate and draw conclusions
  3. 3Interpret and analyse
  4. 4Formulate questions
  5. 5Gather and organize information
2
Match each inquiry question to its type.
What is the population of Sudbury?
How do summers in Halifax and Regina differ?
Why are so many wetlands in southern Ontario disappearing?
How might Arctic sea ice change shipping routes by 2050?
Should our town build a new arena or a new library?
3
Which of these is a primary source for a study of erosion along a local creek?
4
An image of a wildfire looks real, but the street signs in it are made of jumbled letters and one person seems to have six fingers. What is the best next step?
5
What is the name for checking what other independent sources say about a claim or a website, instead of reading only that website?
6
Which statement about Native Land Digital (native-land.ca) is accurate?
7
Which source is most likely to be biased about the benefits of a new shopping mall?
8
Name the Inuktitut place name for Nunavut's capital, which means "place of many fish."
9
Which question is the strongest inquiry question?

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