Geography

Geography Curriculum Overview KS3

Geography Curriculum Overview KS4

Key Stage 3 Curriculum Overview - Geography

 Rationale

The study matrix allows study at various scales, local issues including the closure of secondary industry on Teesside and a fieldwork study on urban change through Darlington enable students to see the impact of geography on their local area and their lives. A focus on geographical issues for countries with different levels of development has been established through looking at HIC’s such as the UK and flooding within Boscastle, NEE’s such as economic and social change in China and LIC’s such as the opportunities and challenges of tourism in Kenya. The matrix also provides a balance physical and human geography throughout each year in KS3 to ensure repetition of similar concepts throughout time. The human geography aspects of the curriculum include; settlement, development, urbanisation, tourism and migration. The physical aspects include; ecosystems, coasts, rivers, deserts, tectonics and rocks. Pupils are encouraged to be inquisitive and make decisions throughout the course. Specific examples of this include; decision making exercises on the eruption of Montserrat and fieldwork entitled ‘To what extent does Darlington fit the Burgess Model’ which will be introduced in 2020.

Intent

The intent behind the curriculum is to provide students with a sound and clear understanding of a range of features, places and processes. Students will learn at a range of scales including how the structure of their own town has changed over time at a local scale to national events such as the Boscastle floods and international disasters in North America and the Caribbean. The course is structured to provide students with a sound grasp of key vocabulary within the AQA GCSE syllabus taught through engaging content which develops a love of the subject. For example, global population change is not taught in the AQA GCSE Syllabus however these are within taught within key stage three at St Aidan’s as they help develop other areas of the subject such as urbanisation. By the end of the key stage we should have learners that can identify trends and links between different geographical concepts such as deindustrialisation, change in UK cities and the global trade network impacting the development of countries. Students will also develop and appreciation of different cultures and understand how problems are solved in other parts of the world such as Kenya using tourism to boost its HDI score. Embedded within the course are key geographical skills such as data interpretation, literacy and numeracy. Embedding these skills will allow fluency of them across the academy curriculum enabling pupils to express view and make deductions independently in the future, a key skill in later life.

Implementation

The course has a balance of human and physical geography that is interleaved between year 7 and 8 so that Students access similar skills and content in greater depth over time. The curriculum develops learner’s knowledge and understanding of geographical concepts at a local, national and global scale and as of 2020 - 2021 fieldwork will be embedded with the Year 7 curriculum to give pupils an understanding and appreciation of fieldwork skills. Assessments have the look and feel of GCSE assessments combined with a similar structure regarding the type and demand of questions. All assessments have at least one 9-mark question with the exception of AP1 in year 7 which caps at a 6-mark question due to the skills nature of the first unit of work. The demand of the geographical content within the curriculum builds as pupil’s progress through KS3 to ensure schema are build upon through time and all pupils are sufficiently challenged.

Impact

The impact will be students who grow up with a solid comprehension of how different aspects of the human and physical world interact and how their actions have impacts on the world around them, such as choosing to buy fair trade produce in the future. They will be better global citizens because of this understanding and will have an appreciation that people in other parts of the world and even in the same country live very different lives due to disparities in wealth and differences in culture. Student will develop strong literacy skills and be able to transfer knowledge and understanding between different disciplines through learning how to express and develop opinions, which are essential skills for a future in the modern world of work.

Key Stage 4 Curriculum Overview - Geography

Rationale

The study of geography at key stage four as of 2019 has an even split of human and physical geography and so students experience a wide range of geographical concepts. In year 9 The Challenge of Natural Hazards and Urban Issues and Challenges are taught, building on natural hazards and urbanisation (People and Cities) which were taught in year 7 during Key Stage Three. In year 10, students complete the Physical Landscapes unit, the Economic World and finally the Living World, which develop the concepts taught in Coasts, Rivers, Deserts, the UK Employment Structure and Economics and Trade in KS3. In Year 11 students complete the Challenge of Resource Management unit of work and then complete their fieldwork enquiries, before learning their issue enquiry. Geographical skills are embedded throughout the course in all units. Human and physical topics have been interleaved throughout the course.

Intent

The intent behind the curriculum is to produce geographers who have a detailed understanding of the human and physical world and can apply this to their lives in the future. Pupils will gain a solid understanding of complex and abstract concepts such as how burning fossil fuels causes the greenhouse effect and then applying this concept to the implications to global food production, or how the Global Atmospheric Circulation Model impacts global climate. By the end of KS4 students should have a sound grasp of how cause and consequence impact the world around them and of how people impact the human and natural environments in both positive and negative ways. Students will also be able to make judgements and inferences independently using data, graphs and images to assess the significance of events on people and the natural world as such skills are embedded through the entire course. Pupils will learn at a range of scales such as local, national and international and have a good understanding of geographical issues in places in the UK and abroad. Map and numeracy skills are also developed in order to solve problems in a variety of contexts within all units of work.

Implementation

The curriculum has been interleaved to ensure that pupils have the return to similar concepts taught previously thus gaining a better understanding of how they link together and developing student’s retrieval skills. Natural Hazards and urbanisation are taught within year 9 as these two units are both engaging and relatively straightforward, allowing pupils to build their skills at the beginning of the GCSE. Natural Hazards is a physical unit of work which allows pupils to sequence and explain the causes of natural phenomena, a skill which is built upon in the Physical Landscapes unit of work taught towards the end of year 9 and the beginning of year 10. Urbanisation has strong links to the changing Economic World (taught in year 10) as development is a major cause of Urbanisation thus similar retrieval occurs between these two units of work. Similar retrieval and interconnectivity between content occurs between the Changing Economic World and Resource Management unit of work. Pupils are assessed in a manner which uses retrieval over long period of time. AP assessments assess different topics taught previously as well as the current content. This means students must use retrieval techniques through the course and encourages effective revision over a long period of time. Assessment culminates in AP3 and by the end of year 10 this requires knowledge and skills from most of the GCSE course.

Impact

 The impact of the GCSE is to create will rounder geographers who have the skills and knowledge to gain a deep understanding of the human and natural world. They will understand the interactions complex interactions between the human and physical environment in a range of places and scales, allowing them to make informed decisions to challenging problems. Students of geography will leave St Aidan’s Academy being able to identify and explain the world around them and weigh up the advantages and disadvantages of the actions of themselves and others. Students will have gained considerable investigative and literary skills which are invaluable at further and higher education, and within many areas of the employment market.