The Journal of The Korean Association of Geographic and Environmental Education ISSN:1226-511X(Print) 2586-5641(Online) 한국지리환경교육학회지

This study aims to analyze content articulation across grade bands and school levels in the geography curriculum of the 2022 revised social studies curriculum. To this end, geography-related achievement standards for elementary grades 3–4, elementary grades 5–6, and middle school grades 1–3 were examined. The analysis focused on the arrangement patterns of achievement standards and types of content articulation, using key ideas and the subcategories of knowledge and understanding as analytical frameworks. The findings show that the 2022 revised social studies geography curriculum was generally designed with consideration of articulation across school levels; however, the actual patterns of articulation differed depending on the content elements. “Location and territory,” “Spatial analysis,” “Climatic environment,” “Geomorphological environment,” “Human–environment interaction,” “Population,” and “Sustainable environment” showed relatively stable expanding-sequence patterns of articulation. In contrast, “Place and region,” “Culture,” “Urban and rural settlements,” and “Economy and transportation” tended to be attenuated or become less explicitly represented in elementary grades 5–6 and then reappear as analytically elaborated concepts in middle school. In addition, “Sustainable world” was mainly addressed in upper elementary grades and middle school, showing a mixed patterns of emergence and expansion. These findings suggest that the issue of articulation in the 2022 revised social studies geography curriculum is not simply a matter of whether achievement standards appear across grade bands. Rather, it is closely related to the differing principles of content organization between theme-based geography learning in elementary school and regional geography-centered learning in middle school. In particular, the domain of human environments and human life revealed a likelihood of conceptual leap due to the lack of intermediary learning experiences in the upper elementary grades before students encounter middle school regional geography. Based on these findings, this study derives implications for the organization of and articulation within elementary and middle school social studies geography curricula. This study is significant in that it analyzes articulation in the 2022 revised social studies geography curriculum and identifies specific gaps and patterns of content continuity and articulation across elementary and middle school levels. However, because the analysis was based primarily on achievement standards and their accompanying curriculum commentary, it has limitations in fully identifying content-level articulation that is not explicitly represented in curriculum documents. Future research should incorporate textbooks, teaching and learning materials, and actual classroom cases to comprehensively examine how curriculum articulation is actually implemented in school contexts.