Geography
“A high-quality geography education should inspire in pupils a curiosity and fascination about the world and its people that will remain with them for the rest of their lives. Teaching should equip pupils with knowledge about diverse places, people, resources and natural and human environments, together with a deep understanding of the Earth’s key physical and human processes. As pupils progress, their growing knowledge about the world should help them to deepen their understanding of the interaction between physical and human processes, and of the formation and use of landscapes and environments. Geographical knowledge, understanding and skills provide the frameworks and approaches that explain how the Earth’s features at different scales are shaped, interconnected and change over time.”
Geography: Purpose of Study from the 2014 National Curriculum.
What are we trying to achieve?
Our Geography curriculum is part of our ‘Big Idea’ of Planet Earth and the Universe and enables our children to:
- develop contextual knowledge of the location of globally significant places – both terrestrial and marine – including their defining physical and human characteristics and how these provide a geographical context for understanding the actions of processes;
- understand the processes that give rise to key physical and human geographical features of the world, how these are interdependent and how they bring about spatial variation and change over time;
- are competent in the geographical skills needed to:
- collect, analyse and communicate with a range of data gathered through experiences of fieldwork that deepen their understanding of geographical processes;
- interpret a range of sources of geographical information, including maps, diagrams, globes, aerial photographs and Geographical Information Systems (GIS);
- communicate geographical information in a variety of ways, including through maps, numerical and quantitative skills and writing at length.
Geography Themes
- Locational Knowledge
- Place Knowledge
- Human Geography
- Physical Geography
- Geographical Skills
- Fieldwork
Our Geography Curriculum Progression of Knowledge 2022-2023 and Geography Curriculum Progression of Skills 2022-2023 show how our children develop their knowledge and skills in Geography during their time with us.
Our Geography Curriculum Progression of Vocabulary 2022-2023 lists the Geography vocabulary we want our children to focus on in their lessons. Our children will learn many more words than this, but these are the key words that will help them understand Geography and link the knowledge they have learned to other areas of the curriculum.
How do we organise learning?
We have developed our own Geography curriculum to reflect the National Curriculum and our local area (Combs Ford → Stowmarket → Suffolk). This ensures that our children progress by knowing more, remembering more and being able to do more. You can find out more about how we structure our Geography teaching in our Geography Non-Negotiables.
Our Geography Curriculum Overview shows the units of work our children will experience during their time with us.
Geography is blocked against History in all years and is taught for 1 lesson every week every other half term. This is shown in our timetables.
How well are we achieving our aims?
Updated on 22/03/23 by JA and KJD.
