Intent

'A high-quality geography education brings together careful selection of content, organisation of that content, choice of teaching approaches, assessment and other factors.

The geography curriculum maps out the knowledge that pupils learn to gain geographical expertise. In planning the curriculum, the nature of the discipline should inform content and activity choices to ensure that pupils learn and can consider their own answers to geographical questions.' Ofsted research review series June 2021

At Park House Primary School, through active engagement in primary geography, children are enabled to learn not only about the world but also how it works, how it fits together and how to make a difference and become positive contributors to it.

We believe that Geography helps to provoke and provide answers to questions about the natural and human aspects of the world. The geography curriculum at Park House Primary School enables children to develop knowledge and skills that are transferable to other curriculum areas and which can be used to promote their spiritual, moral, social and cultural development.

Geography is, by nature, an investigative subject, which develops an understanding of concepts, knowledge and skills. Our aim is to inspire in children a curiosity and fascination about the world and its people which will remain with them for the rest of their lives. We will develop the children’s interest and understanding of The World's diverse places, people, resources and natural and human environments, together with a deep understanding of the Earth’s key physical and human processes. We will always refer back to our own local and physical geography wherever possible, either as a comparison to somewhere else in the world or as a tool to finding out more about the unique place in which we live.

Implementation

Geography at Park House is taught as a discrete subject but we will make links with other subject areas wherever it is possible and there are genuine links to be made.

Teachers will ask enquiry based questions at the beginning of each lesson and will refer back to previous learning through recap questioning. This helps deepen the children's knowledge of the four substantive areas of Geography. (Locational knowledge, Place knowledge, Environmental, Human and Physical Geography and Geographical skills and fieldwork)

At the beginning of each enquiry, a ‘Memorable Experience’ is planned to entice, enthuse and immerse the children in their learning. Opportunities are given to each year group for children to convey what they know already as well as what they would like to investigate and find out. Wherever possible, children will carry out 'real life' fieldwork activities such as River studies, (Holmebrook) and mapwork in the local area.

Consideration is given to how greater depth will be taught, learnt and demonstrated within each lesson, as well as how learners will be supported in line with the school’s commitment to inclusion. This may include additional resources such as photos, age appropriate atlases and 1:1 scribing.

The class teacher records the assessments on the school’s foundation subject assessments at the end of each term. This data is analysed to improve the children’s learning in Geography.

Impact

Outcomes in books, discussions with the children through whole class, group and individual enquiry and general observations made during fieldwork activities evidence a broad and balanced geography curriculum and demonstrate children’s acquisition of identified key knowledge and skills. 

Children are able to review their successes in achieving the lesson objectives and are actively encouraged to identify their own areas of development. This is captured through the newly introduced knowledge organisers and will form the starting point at the beginning of the following lesson.

  As children progress throughout the school, they develop a deep knowledge, understanding and appreciation of their local area and its place within the wider geographical context.

We measure the impact of our curriculum through the following methods;

• Learning walks and professional dialogue with teachers.
• Summative assessment based on pupil discussion about their learning/termly data input
• Images and videos of the children’s practical learning
• Interviewing pupils about their learning (pupil voice)
• Moderation staff meetings where pupil’s books are scrutinised and there is an opportunity for dialogue between teachers to discuss the learning and teaching in their class.

Next steps:

Purchase new resources in liaison with staff (age appropriate atlases, globes, high quality fieldwork resources)

Introduce and review the impact of Knowledge organisers

Review the impact of the new Geography Enquiry questions at the end of each half term.

Oversee planning, delivery and assessment of Geography

Keep staff updated and share digital resources to support learning across school. Wherever possible provide CPD raining to staff.