Geography

Geography Co-ordinator: Mrs M Richardson

Our curriculum is designed to give all learners the knowledge and skills that they need to appreciate how our world works and how to make a difference by becoming positive contributors to it. We want our children to develop the geographical knowledge and skills to inspire them to explore, navigate and understand the world around them and their place in it.

The planning and sequencing of our curriculum will enable pupils to build on previous learning and enable children to know more, remember more and do more. As children move through the school, we have chosen our topics carefully to allow children to build their knowledge of the world both within geography and through links with other subjects.

As a Catholic school, we help our children to develop their CSPP Virtues and Values. This leads our Geography curriculum to encourage learners to be compassionate towards others both near and far, intentional in the way that they live and use the world’s resources, grateful for the wonders of our world and other people, and discerning about their choices and the effects of those choices.

Our curriculum aims to:

• stimulate learners’ life-long curiosity in their own surroundings, both in diverse areas of the United Kingdom and around the world;
• give children the opportunities to make observations and form opinions;
• teach children to understand how physical features and the environment affect peoples’ lifestyles;
• foster a sense of wonder in our students at the beauty of the world around us;
• develop an understanding of the Earth’s key physical and human processes.
• give children a sense of responsibility in caring for the Earth;
• challenge stereotypes and develop an awareness and appreciation of cultural and economic diversity;
• acquire and develop the skills for conducting geographical enquiries.

How to Help your Child at Home

You will receive a Knowledge Organiser for each Geography topic your child is taught. This shows the key content that your child will be taught and is a good starting point for conversations about what your child is learning. Please remember that these are given out at the start of the unit and your child will learn progressively across the term. Encourage your child to tell you about what they are currently learning using this as a prompt. Can they talk you through any of the maps and diagrams? Can they define or use any of the key vocabulary? Looking back at previous Knowledge Organisers is also really useful to recap previous learning to help embed knowledge over time.

Other key skills in Geography include finding out about and comparing different places within the UK and around the world. Just using google maps or google earth and looking at photos of different places can be a great start. Here are a list of questions that could start some discussions about different places.

• What might you see if you were to visit here? Why do you think that?
• What would you need to pack to go travelling here? Why?
• What do you think it would be like to live there?
• What would be similar/different to living here?
• Would you like to visit there? Why?

Things that are happening in the news can also be a good start for discussions. Some content of the news will not be appropriate, but there are many websites that are child friendly (see below). Check the website before using with your child and choose any articles that you feel would be suitable.

USEFUL WEBSITES

Google Earth

CBBC - Newsround

National Geographic for Kids