Students will use maps to draw conclusions about the region of the Osage Prairies. This region has been described as the least distinctive area of the state, the region with the fewest distinguishing characteristics of Missouri. The Osage Prairies has neither the hills of the Ozark Highlands, nor the nearly flat relief of the Southeast Lowlands. The region was not uplifted like the Ozark Highlands, nor glaciated like the Northern Glaciated Plains. Yet the Osage Prairies still forms a distinctive region of our state, a region distinguishable on maps.
Maps are the basic tool of the geographer.
If money, or currency, is the medium we use to exchange goods, then maps are indeed the currency whereby geographers exchange information. A love of maps has drawn many persons to the study of geography. Many people like to look at, to study maps. Thus, using maps is not the first of the eighteen new geography standards by accident. By using maps, students can gain a good understanding of the region of Missouri known as the Osage Prairies.