How do we implement Geography?
How do we implement our Geography curriculum?
Our Geography Curriculum offers a coherently planned sequence of lessons ensuring that children have the necessary knowledge, understanding and skills outlined in the National Curriculum.
We have developed a ‘Progression of Skills’ document which enables pupils to build on and develop their knowledge and skills within and across each year. The skills document is separated into the strands ‘Location and Place knowledge’, ‘Human and physical geography’ and ‘Geographical skills and fieldwork’ - however, these strands are often combined and woven throughout every teaching session so that children are provided with opportunities to develop their geographical skills across a range of areas and situations.
At St. Margaret’s, we follow a creative approach so a variety of subjects (such as Maths, Writing, Reading, Computing) are incorporated within each geography session. Geography is taught within every term and all sessions link with the term’s theme; this helps make the learning relevant and purposeful.
Our Geography Curriculum is designed so that children start with ‘themselves’ and their school and local area before working out to areas or regions of the United Kingdom and the rest of the world. Through our creative curriculum approach, we provide purposeful platforms for exploring, appreciating and understanding the world in which we live and how it has evolved. We want to ensure that through geography, pupils are able to explore the relationship between the Earth and its people through the study of place, space and environment.
We intend for children to become passionate and knowledgeable about our local community and beyond, by learning through experiences in practical and fieldwork activities. Effective use of visitors and ‘expert talks’ are planned to enrich and enhance the pupil’s learning experiences within the Geography Curriculum and educational visits (where in-depth fieldwork opportunities such as children going out into the field to conduct observations, surveys, investigations, field sketches, using compasses and maps etc) are planned as much as possible.
Opportunities are regularly provided for children to choose their own method of recording and presenting their work to match the learning question and this helps to enhance independence and resilience.
Children regularly present information and their findings to the class and this helps to foster strong communication and language skills.
Every unit opens with opportunities to share what children already know about a topic; this helps act as a good assessment tool so teachers can effectively plan future lessons to ensure all pupils are challenged and reach their full potential.
Each session starts with ‘Geography Fluency’. The tasks asked within the fluency warm-up help pupils to successfully review previous learning of not only their current topic but also the learning of previous units taught earlier in the year or within previous year groups; this supports children to know and remember more key geographical knowledge.
Children help create key vocabulary banks/packs at the start of units which detail key information, key questions and vocabulary. This is not used as part of an assessment but to support children with their acquisition of knowledge and are used as reference documents.
Geography resources are readily available for pupils to use within lessons and this helps to foster independence. We also have geography resources available on our playground for pupils to engage with during their break and lunch time should they wish to do so and we also provide links on our geography page on our school website to help deepen children’s understanding and knowledge outside of the classroom.
In geography lessons, children are given clear success criteria in order to achieve the Learning Question and effective modelling and scaffolding of tasks by teachers ensures that children are able to fully access the geography curriculum and achieve their full capabilities.
To support teaching, staff access a range of resources and planning including access to a range of online map resources and the Geographical Association. Effective CPD is carried out throughout the year to ensure high levels of confidence and knowledge are maintained.
