Quite simply, “Geography” broken down means “to study the earth” and throughout your studies in the book, we are going to expand on this definition. If you were to go home and ask your parents about geography they may have studied in school, they might say when they were students they memorized the states and capitals, or major countries in the world. This is only one part of what geography really is however. To study geography is to study where we are in the world; what the world around us is like. It is the study of who lives there and why.

This is an encyclopedia entry for the term "ecosystem." An ecosystem is a geographic area where plants, animals, and other organisms, as well as weather and landscape, work together to form a bubble of life. Text for this entry is appropriate for the middle and high school grade levels.