ST MARY'S CATHOLIC PRIMARY SCHOOL
Being a geographer
Our Mission Statement
Celebrating Excellence through our Faith and Learning
Rationale for teaching Geography at St Mary's
At St Mary’s, we believe that our children need a curriculum that allows them to become enthusiastic and engaged learners. We intend for our pupils to leave St Mary's as curious, knowledgable, skilled members of society. We hope that they will have a diverse understanding of the world we live in and that they will be keen to learn and discover more.
How we teach Geography at St Mary's
At St Mary's, we follow an Enquiry based curriculum. This involves seuqential, connected and progressive learning based on The National Curriculum.
Learning is progressive and follows a knowledge building pattern to ensure confidence and depth in learning. Geography is embedded within enquiries and children are encouraged to think of themselves as geographers in their lessons. Enquiry questions underpin the term of learning, in which the children undertake an investigation to answer the question. One example is 'why do we live here? This question gives year 4 children the opportunity to learn about settlement, migration, and human geography. At the end of the enquiry, children take part in a final challenge which enables them to 'sum up' their learning and reflect on what they have learnt.
Our enquiries seek to give pupils experiential opportunities for learning. This equips them will skills that they can apply outside of the classroom and will enable them to be confident, self-assured, able adults. We like to make children aware of the geography of their local area where possible to ensure that it is relevant to them, whilst maintaining links to the wider world. We seek visitors and experiences from the local community to enrich learning, including professional and close-to-home sources such as children's families. We make good use of the local area to support children's understanding of geography.of Bristol. This includes visits to Three Brooks Nature Reserve to map out and identify the features of a our local area.
How we assess Geography at St Mary's.
When pupils leave St Mary’s, they will be able 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
We measure attainment using short quizzes at the end of each enquiry - this enables the class teacher to understand whether knowledge has been secured by all of the children.
Progression as Geographers
Click here to see how children at St Mary's progress as Geographers.
If you want to be a geographer at home, try these ideas:
Websites:
Activities:
- Get to know your local area by drawing a map with a key. Follow the map and see if you get lost!
- Draw an aerial map of your bedroom/garden/street/area
- Visit your local library for free resources
- Plan a 'around the world' trip - what is the best route? Where will you start/end? How will you travel?
- Ask an adult to help you find a pen pal in a different country
For more information about Geography at St Mary's, please contact Miss E Blackwell (Year 5 Class Teacher).