FOR THE INUIT OF CANADA's northern territory Nunavut, the links between geography and their daily lives is strong.

That's why Ken Beardsall was so concerned that there were no geography classes for Inuit students, and why he spent more than 10 years working on a geography curriculum to be used by the grade 10 students scattered in tiny communities across this vast region.

"There is no geography- just Social Studies with bits of geography slipped in here and there," says Beardsall. "We follow the Alberta curriculum in high school and . . . in Kingston a year ago it was revealed that Alberta is among the provinces which place the least emphasis on Geography."

Under the new curriculum, traditional knowledge will meet high-technology.

"There's a unit called Navigation where students will learn to use G.P.S. (Global Positioning System) receivers as well as studying the orientation of snow drifts to the prevailing winds as a means of traveling in the right direction," says Beardsall.

His interest in bringing geography lessons geared to the northern way of life to Inuit students goes back to the mid-1980s when he studied at Trent University. At the time, he did an honours thesis that combined physical geography and native studies. Partly funded by the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, Beardsall went to Coral Harbour to study traditional Inuit knowledge of geography. A year later, in 1988, he moved there to teach. Three years ago, Nunavutís three school boards began working out some of the problems associated with teaching high schools in small remote communities. It was then that Beardsall was able to push for a geography section.

"I was fortunate to be chosen for the Keewatin Social Studies Committee where I finally found a place to vent my feelings about the lack of geography," he says. "The other members were equally concerned about this and so the Geography of Nunavut course began to be developed as an alternative grade 10 Social Studies subject."

With the geography program set up, and with the possibility of a grade 11 history of Nunavut course being discussed, Beardsall says he is pondering taking a leave from teaching to take a Masters of Curriculum Design program in Ontario. But he still has reservations about that idea.

"The matter of up-rooting my family for a year and bringing them from this small Arctic hamlet to a big Ontario city is a bit daunting -- not to mention switching seats with the teacher after 11 years!" he says.

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