Geography

Intent

At Blair Peach Primary our Geography curriculum is designed to develop children’s curiosity and fascination about the world they live in. This includes the children learning the location of different countries, cities and towns in the UK and across the world and learning about the human and physical geography of these locations. It also includes the children learning what it is like to live in these places by making observations, carrying out research, reading graphs and charts and asking geographical questions.

At Blair Peach we are committed to providing our children with opportunities to investigate their local area, so they can have a deeper understanding of who they are, where they live and what makes our area so unique and special. Within lessons, children use a wide variety of different skills to develop their geographical knowledge.

Our aims are to ensure that our students experience a wide breadth of study and have, by the end of each key stage, long-term memory of the knowledge and concepts that have been covered

Implementation

In Early Years, Geography is taught via the Early Learning Goals linked to the Specific Area ‘Understanding the World’. The majority of learning in this area occurs through adult intervention when the children are in continuous provision. However, during their time in Early Years the children will listen to stories set in different locations, engage in a unit titled ‘All About Me’ and participate in topic led work about the world they live in.

By the end of Early Years therefore, the children should be able to:

Know about similarities and differences in relation to places, objects, materials and living things

• Be able to talk about the features of their own immediate environment and how environments might vary from one another.
• Be able to make observations of animals and plants and explain why some things occur, and talk about changes.

In Years 1 – 6, Geography is taught in a 6-8-week block of lessons, which on average last about an hour each. This timing however in this block is flexible depending on the content being covered and the skills being developed.

Each Unit of Work has been carefully written using the guidance from a range of resources such as the Geographical Association, Chris Quigley Curriculum Champions. 

To ensure the full coverage of the National Curriculum and Progression in concepts the school has an overview of the topics coverage and progression in concepts documents, which show how the children will progress in their learning as they move further up the school and into Year 6

To ensure that:

• The children remember the long-term content.
• The children understand that they are systematically learning.
• The children can integrate new knowledge into larger concepts.

At the start of each unit, the children will be given a Knowledge organiser which will have information about the unit they are learning and a list of key vocabulary and definitions

Geography lessons are taught through an enquiry based approach. This allows our children to develop their proficiency in the asking and answering of relevant questions, collecting and analysing data and drawing conclusions. Each year group will have a main enquiry question that they are looking to answer at the end of the unit, with each lesson being based around a sub enquiry question. Through investigations and discussions, children will deepen their knowledge on their chosen topic. As children move throughout the school, they will use and build upon their skill sets. Our lessons are enriched with a range of different outdoor learning opportunities, with children going on trips and carrying out geographical surveys around our local area.  Within our lessons we actively make links to the wider world by discussing the sustainability and the UNCRC rights and Sustainable Development Goals.

Impact

The intended impact of the Geography Curriculum is that the majority of children in each year group are working at or above the expected level for their age.

Retrieval of previously learned content is frequent and regular, which increases both storage and retrieval strength.

In addition, it is the intended impact that the children:

• are inspired by the Geography Curriculum and want to learn more.
• show the progression in their skills and knowledge, especially in map reading, compass work and locating places on a map.
• can discuss their learning and remember what they have learnt.
• can talk about their first-hand experiences of visiting different places and locations.

At Blair Peach we believe history and geography are a valuable part of children’s education. Children not only acquire knowledge but also foster lifelong skills which will allow them to explore and understand the world around them.

History and Geography are becoming increasingly linked and are therefore often known to the children as topic lessons, where Specific Geography skills taught include; mapping; using sources of information; learning specifics about the area of study, such as the names of important rivers and mountains and comparing places.

History teaching aims to develop enquiry and research skills as well as enabling children to organise and convey information in a variety of ways. They consider ways in which the past is represented and handle and interpret artefacts from the period of study.  Over the seven years at the school, children will develop a sense of chronology.  The periods covered are very varied and include: Ancient Britain, The Romans, Saxons and Vikings amongst others.

Geography Key Stage 1

During Key Stage 1 pupils investigate their local area and a contrasting area in the United Kingdom or abroad; they learn about the environment in both areas and the people who live there. They also begin to learn about the wider world.

They carry out geographical inquiries inside and outside the classroom. Children have the opportunity to ask geographical questions about people, places and environments as well as develop geographical skills using resources such as maps and photographs.

Geography Key Stage 2

During Key Stage 2 pupils investigate a variety of people, places and environments in the United Kingdom and abroad. They start to make links between different places in the world. In addition, they find out how people affect the environment and how they are affected by it. Children develop geographical enquiry where learning takes place both inside and outside the classroom. This gives them the opportunity to ask geographical questions, and use geographical skills and resources such as maps, atlases, aerial photographs and ICT.