Geography

We are geographers..

Intent

At Wrington C of E Primary School, our Geography curriculum is designed to develop children’s passion and knowledge of their local area as well as their curiosity about the wider world. We want to instil in children a respect for our diverse world and to understand the importance of cherishing it.

‘The study of geography is about more than just memorizing places on a map. It's about understanding the complexity of our world, appreciating the diversity of cultures that exists across continents. And in the end, it's about using all that knowledge to help bridge divides and bring people together.’ – Barack Obama, 2012.

Children investigate a range of places – both in Britain and abroad – to help develop their knowledge and understanding of the Earth’s physical and human processes. We are committed to providing children with opportunities to investigate and make enquiries about their local area of Wrington (beginning with our school site) as well as Bristol. This is so that the children can develop a real sense of identity, as well as grow their understanding surrounding their heritage and understand what makes our local area so very valuable and special.

Our concern for the earth and our legacy also means that in our teaching of geographical knowledge and understanding, we introduce children to the UN Sustainable Development Goals and the impact of human beings on our world. We also try to make cross curricular links between geography and other subject areas where possible to enhance children's understanding and deepen their knowledge.

 Implementation

To ensure children receive a comprehensive and progressive Geography curriculum, we follow a clear, planned and sequenced scheme of work in line with the National Curriculum, inspired by the works of Chris Quigley’s Curriculum Companion. The Curriculum Companion for geography helps teachers to support their pupils form a geography schema by using and revisiting concepts as the basis for the schema, strengthening the schema with knowledge as well as further deepening connections through tasks.

Geography at Wrington C of E Primary School is taught as a subject in its own right. Children take part in role-play, debates, create presentations and prepare reports for the rest of the class. The children are assessed against the objectives for their sessions and are given feedback in order to identify their next steps. The local area is fully utilised to achieve the desired outcomes, with opportunities for learning outside the classroom embedded in practice. The UN Sustainable Goals are an additional aspect of the curriculum we teach in Wrington with its many physical and human geographical links.

Our Geography curriculum and planning covers the knowledge outlined in the National Curriculum through broad, challenging and inspiring themes. Progression is implemented across the whole school in knowledge, skills and vocabulary so that pupils by the end of year 6 have the relevant skills and desire to be successful in Geography in their future learning.  

The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) follows the ‘Development Matters in the EYFS’ guidance which aims for all children in reception to have an ‘Understanding of the World; people and communities, the world and technology’ by the end of the academic year.

Field work is an important part of learning about the geographical world. During their time at Wrington, children will visit contrasting localities to broaden their understanding of physical geography. In addition to visits around our direct local area, children experience the coasts at Weston-super-Mare and North Devon. Children also visit the cities of Wells, Bristol and London. 

We have a stock of resources to aid the children’s learning, most notably when undertaking field work, such as clipboards, compasses, binoculars and a range of maps. We treasure our well-stocked library as an additional source of resources and value the use of high quality non-fiction texts, atlases and other geography related books. Children have the opportunity to use a variety of data, such as maps, statistics, graphs, pictures, photographs and the Internet, to develop the skills of research, investigation, analysis and problem solving. Children also use IT, such as data loggers, in enquiry-based research activities. They then use the skills they have developed in literacy, numeracy and ICT to record and report their findings.

At Wrington C of E Primary School, we also provide the children the opportunities to help in the assistance of supervising, manage and, in some cases, transforming the school grounds. There is an ‘Eco’ club which is organised and run by an experienced member of staff and which is popular with the children of the school. During ‘Eco’ club, the children have grown their own fruit and vegetables as well as tending to the local grounds and exploring and expanding their geographical vocabulary, skills and knowledge.

Impact

Through our approach to the teaching of Geography, our children will achieve well, with most meeting end of year expectations. They will be able to develop their skills, knowledge and understanding well throughout each academic year.

• Children will display a natural curiosity about, and inspired a love of, our world, both in terms of the physical and human geographical features.
• The emphasis that is placed on the Global Goals for Sustainable Development and its geographical links  will impact on children's long term care and respect for our planet and the responsibilities that we all have towards it.
• The school will be well resourced with geographical displays and resources.
• Children will be able to articulate their learning and use geographical terminology confidently.
• Their learning will be evident from topic work in books which will cover a range of geographical learning and cross curricular links will be made where possible.
• Children will be engaged in geography lessons and have a positive attitude towards the subject.