Lines of communication

Yuan Xiao effortlessly draws with chalk on the blackboard, as he explains the distribution of ocean currents to a roomful of students.

It takes about a minute before a map of continental plates emerges, on which he highlights the direction of the ocean currents, while waxing lyrical on their influence over vegetation near their path.

The vivid explanation, through informative hand-drawn graphics, is routine for 20-something Yuan, who is currently teaching geography at the Jinan University Town Experimental Senior High School in Shandong province.

Last year, Yuan's ability to draw blackboard illustrations that break down abstract geographical knowledge went viral online. One of the most popular educational videos featuring his teaching methods received more than 720,000 likes on Douyin.

Yuan first noticed how most of his students perceived geography when he started his teaching career three years ago.

"Some of them jokingly referred to it as a mystery, because of its extensive and complex points," Yuan says, adding that the subject can sometimes strain the students' sense of logic.

However, after spending time in Yuan's class, the students' stereotypical views about geography have been dispelled.

Although his school has projectors, Yuan believes that compared to slides, traditional blackboard presentation is more conducive to understanding and mastery of the subject matter, as well as enhancing memory of key points.

"You've got to show the logic every step of the way, and in a manner that makes an impression," he says.

In 2022, Yuan recorded his classes and uploaded them to Douyin, as some of his students had to leave school to prepare for the entrance examination for art college.

They immediately became an online sensation.

His followers were first amazed by his improvised drawings, which cover phenomena such as the Earth's rotation and revolution, and were also drawn to his fascinating explanations of what lies behind even the most mundane phenomena, knowledge that Yuan made easily accessible.

From a geographic perspective, he showed the reasons for the distinctive fragrance of jasmine flowers in Hengzhou in the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, and how Guizhou's provincial capital Guiyang derives its name.

Many viewers left comments saying they never realized the subject could be so enjoyable during their school years, and how the videos have helped them see things they used to take for granted in a fresh light.

Yuan's online followers even started to ask him geography-related questions about personal geographic experiences and difficult topics from high school geography exams, which have all been a source of inspiration for new science videos.

Yuan records videos addressing these questions, often using his signature blackboard drawings to clarify important points for viewers.

The comments on his videos often lead to debates and discussions about geography.

"This shows that people's curiosity for nature is universal, and in each individual there is a geographer," Yuan says.

The popularity of his online videos bolsters his faith in teaching geography, which he believes can help the public gain a deeper understanding of various aspects of the world and deal with practical issues.

Practical geography was one of Yuan's postgraduate research topics, but he admits that it was not until he became a teacher that his understanding of it deepened.

To give students a good measure of the discipline's practical applications, Yuan has taken them to observe Venus transiting across the moon, and the changes in shadows around them, while explaining the reasons behind these phenomena.

"I try to encourage my students to go outside and explore the world," Yuan says.

He has also applied for access to an area at the school to grow plants and conduct other practical activities that bring the students into contact with the land, because he considers such activities crucial to learning geography.

For many students in Yuan's class, these teaching methods, like blackboard drawings and short videos, are a relaxed and novel way of learning.

Wang Mengfan, Yuan's class representative, still remembers how one short video walked her through the formation of smooth ice spheres under the force of wind and waves.

"Videos like that are like a door to a new world, where you can experience the wonders of nature in the classroom," Wang says.

To date, Yuan has attracted more than 280,000 fans and received almost 4 million likes for his posts.

"I sense that many members of my audience are older than me, and they often urge me to post, which is quite motivating," Yuan says.

He has become widely known among students at the school as an internet celebrity, and they now involve him in their activities, like basketball games and debates.

Yuan says it has given him more incentive to prepare for teaching.

He ingeniously uses short videos from Douyin that he finds relevant as teaching tools.

For example, he has played a video showing elderly people sitting alone at the entrance of their village, and working in fields, to help students raised in urban areas gain a better understanding of cultural geography through the plight of the rural elderly.

In order to explain lunar phases, Yuan once drove to the outskirts of his town and endured freezing temperatures for several hours to photograph the moon as a reference for his students.

As the intensity of his teaching schedule has increased, time for these kinds of outings has become limited. That's why he has turned to Douyin to find videos that contribute to classroom explanations.

Yuan has been able to find videos even for rare geographical phenomena such as bioluminescence on beaches, sun pillars, and circumhorizontal arcs (fire rainbows).

"Playing them in the classroom has never failed to elicit astonishment from my students, and has made the lessons more vivid, engaging and clear," Yuan says.

Yuan graduated from a teacher education program in college, and during postgraduate studies, he participated in a provincial teaching competition for teacher candidates, which inspired him to design a teaching method that combines multimedia assistance with traditional blackboard use.

"Since then, I have been practicing drawing, such as the map of China, and I often use these drawings in my lesson preparations," Yuan says.

In the classroom, Yuan regularly engages students in blackboard drawing exercises to train their sense of logic and visualize geography.

"I try not to simply deliver knowledge to the students; instead, I encourage differences in thinking," he says.

"When discussing a particular topic, I interweave it with points of previously discussed geographical knowledge or intriguing facts, and the students really enjoy it," Yuan says.

He says he has continued to explore and improve his teaching methods, especially since starting to teach senior high school students, and has spared no effort to ensure his classes are thorough.

For example, when he was teaching about rock weathering, a topic that involves physics, chemistry and biology, he did extensive searches, reading research papers and watching animated simulations, absorbing knowledge and translating it into his own words.

"When I step onto the podium, I sense the students are attentive as they nod in agreement," Yuan says.

He says that being a teacher grants a sense of accomplishment and happiness.

"It is enough to excite me all day if I can help my students understand a particular concept that they have found difficult," he adds.

Yuan says he plans to develop a systematic online geography curriculum and share it with the public for free.

"I was born in a small village, and it was geography that exposed me to different natural landscapes, human culture and traditions," Yuan says.

"The subject gave me a longing to see the wider world, and I'd like to help more people experience that."