Geography at All Saints Primary School
Aims
The aims of geography are:
- To stimulate children’s interest in their surroundings and develop a knowledge and understanding of the physical and human processes which shape places.
- To increase children’s knowledge of other cultures and, in so doing, teach a respect and understanding of what it means to be a positive citizen in a multi-cultural country.
- To provide learning opportunities that enthuse, engage, and motivate children to learn and foster a sense of curiosity and wonder at the beauty of the world around them.
- To encourage in children a commitment to sustainable development and an appreciation of what ‘global citizenship’ means.
- To make sense of their own surroundings through learning about their own locality and the interaction between people and the environment.
- To develop the geographical skills, including how to use, draw and interpret maps of different scales, and the vocabulary necessary to carry out effective geographical enquiry.
- To be able to apply map reading skills to globes and atlas maps and identify geographical features.
- To formulate appropriate questions, develop research skills and evaluate material to inform opinions.
- To enable children to work geographically in a range of appropriate contexts, using a variety of materials and equipment including other people’s experiences and knowledge.
Intent
At All Saints we believe that Geography helps to provoke and provide answers to questions about the natural and human aspects of the world. Children are encouraged to develop a greater understanding and knowledge of the world, as well as their place in it. The geography curriculum at All Saints enables children to develop knowledge and skills that are transferable to other curriculum areas and which can and are used to promote their spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. Geography is, by nature, an investigative subject, which develops and understanding of concepts, knowledge and skills. The curriculum is designed develop knowledge and skills that are progressive, as well as transferable, throughout their time at All Saints and also to their further education and beyond.
Implementation
We follow the National Curriculum for the teaching of Geography and ensure that our units of work provide opportunities for children to deepen their understanding in terms of substantive and disciplinary knowledge.
We have a clear progression document for geography that maps the skills taught across all year groups and shows how we build on skills taught in previous years. This means that teachers are clear about which skills to teach in each topic they cover and therefore teach high quality lessons which build on children’s prior knowledge, skills and understanding.
The main strands covered are:
- Geographical enquiry
- Fieldwork/maps
- Location Knowledge
- Place knowledge
- Human and Physical geography
In our lessons children use our 6 core skills to help them become confident geographers with a good knowledge and understanding of Geography.
Geography in KS1 and KS2
In KS1 Children will develop their locational knowledge; they will learn to name and locate the world’s seven continents and five oceans. In addition, they will learn to name, locate and identify the characteristics of the four countries and capital cities of the United Kingdom and its surrounding seas. They will also develop a greater understanding of place by comparing the geographical similarities and differences through studying the human and physical geography of a small area of the United Kingdom, and of a small area in a contrasting non-European country. In addition to developing children’s locational and place knowledge, they will have the opportunity to learn about human and physical geography. During this study, they will identify seasonal and daily weather patterns in the United Kingdom and the location of hot and cold areas of the world in relation to the Equator and the North and South Poles.
Children will develop geographical skills and fieldwork skills, through these three areas of study, where they learn to use world maps, atlases and globes; simple compass directions; aerial photographs and plan perspectives to recognise landmarks and basic human and physical features and to use simple fieldwork and observational skills to study the geography of their local area.
In KS2 children extend and develop their knowledge and understanding beyond the local area to include the United Kingdom and Europe, North and South America; studying the location and characteristics of a range of the world’s most significant human and physical features. They continue to develop their use of geographical knowledge, understanding and skills to enhance their locational and place knowledge. They extend their locational knowledge when they learn to locate and name European countries as well as North and South America countries, concentrating on their environmental regions, key physical and human characteristics, countries, and major cities. In addition to this, they extend their locational knowledge to be able to name and locate counties and cities of the United Kingdom, describing key geographical regions, human and physical characteristics, key topographical features and land-use patterns. This is further extended to identify the position and significance of latitude, longitude, the Equator, the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn, the Arctic and Antarctic Circle and the Greenwich Meridian and time zones. They will build on their understanding of place by comparing the geographical similarities and differences through studying the human and physical geography of a region of the United Kingdom, a region of a European country and a region within North or South America.
In Key stage 2 human and physical geography knowledge is extended to allow children to develop an understanding of aspects of physical geography (investigating climate zones, biomes and vegetation belts, rivers, mountains, volcanoes and earthquakes, and the water cycle) and human geography (learning about types of settlement and land use, economic activity and the distribution of natural resources including energy, food, minerals and water.) Children will continue to develop geographical skills and fieldwork skills, through these three areas of study, where they learn to use maps, atlases and globes and digital/computer mapping; eight-point compass directions; four and six-figure grid references, symbols and keys and the Ordnance Survey maps. They will also use fieldwork to observe, measure, record and present the human and physical features in the local area using a range of methods, including sketch maps, plans and graphs, and digital technologies.
Geography in EYFS
Geography is taught in EYFS as an integral part of the topic work covered during the year. We relate the geographical aspects of the children’s work to the objectives set out in the Early Years curriculum which underpin the planning for children aged three to five. Geography makes a significant contribution to the ELG objectives of developing a child’s understanding of the world through activities such as finding out about different places and habitats and investigating our locality.
