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Geography

At St Mary's C of E Primary School and Nursery geography education should be fully inclusive to every child.

Our aims are to fulfil the requirements of the National Curriculum for geography; providing a broad and balanced curriculum; ensuring the progressive development of geographical concepts, knowledge and skills; and for the children to develop a love for geography. Furthermore, we aim to 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. (The 2014 Primary National Curriculum in England)

Geography teaching at St Mary's School has a wide application to everyday life, teaching the children to enjoy learning about the world and to have a better understanding of how people live in different locations.

The aims of teaching geography in our school are:

  • to inspire pupils’ curiosity to discover more about the world
  • to enable children to know about the location of the world’s continents, countries, cities, seas and oceans and be able to relate this to where they live
  • to develop in children the skills of interpreting a range of sources of geographical information, including maps, diagrams, globes and aerial photographs
  • to help children understand how the human and physical features of a place shapes its location and can change over time
  • to raise awareness and develop an understanding of environmental issues

Vision and Curriculum Drivers

 

Our geography teaching supports our school HEART vision for the children at St Mary's and our Curriculum Drivers as follows: 

 

Health and Happiness – Geography teaching at St Mary's develops pupils sense of place. Through widening horizons and studying people, places and cultures through physical and human geography children's horizon's are broadened developing greater understanding of their place in the world. 

Excellence – Through the geography curriculum's knowledge and skills progression, children develop as geographers. Children develop a sense of responsibility for the world they live in, an awareness of environmental issues and a sense of responsibility as a global citizen..

Aspiration– Children learn about people and places beyond their everyday experiences, therefore developing the cultural capital to be successful in life.

Resilience - The children will, throughout their learning, study changes in human and physical landscapes over time and the effect on the people who lived their. Creating a greater understanding of the resilience and perseverance that was demonstrated and the effect on human lives. Through practicing geographical fieldwork skills and mapping children will develop their own resilience to improve. 

Together - Children will develop their understanding of differing places, cultures and people. Exploring the similarities and differences to their own experiences; broadening their horizons to promote inclusivity and tolerance of the world's diverse cultures. 

 

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.

Barak Obama

Curriculum Drivers
 
Our curriculum for Geography details the subject-specific vocabulary that will enable children to understand and retain concepts and knowledge in the subject.  This vocabulary builds up as the children move through the school. 
 
Through our Geography Curriculum we explicitly teach Oracy skills enabling children to experience a wide-range of contexts for speaking and allowing them to engage in high-quality classroom talk. 
 
The Geography Curriculum allows the children to foster an enjoyment in reading for different purposes. Through utilising a range of genres and text-types, including online maps and atlases, children are provided with frequent opportunities to read, motivated by the information and knowledge they are able to access through inspiring non-fiction books. 
 

We aim for children to 'be the best they can be' both now and in the future. Through increasing knowledge of the local area and further afield, exposure to differing environments and different places, increasing opportunities available to them and widening their experiences children are explicitly and implicitly taught about and immersed in the potential the wider world can offer.