Geography Curriculum Statement of Intent

To develop children’s experiences, understanding, geographical skills and vocabulary.  We teach a creative and hands-on Geography curriculum to inspire children’s interest and curiosity about the wider world giving them the vital tools and cultural capital to become active and reflective members in the world.

Intent 

• To build a Geography curriculum that develops learning and results in the acquisition of Geographical knowledge and skills. This includes locational knowledge, place knowledge, physical themes, human themes and Geographical skills and enquiry. Children will know more, remember more and understand more. This will ensure progress in this subject.
• We aim to not only cover but also to exceed the depth and breadth of the National Curriculum.
• To provide a varied and diverse curriculum that interests our children and meets the needs of all backgrounds, cultures and abilities, including those with SEND needs.
• To create meaningful opportunities to link Geography to other subjects.
• Our scheme is designed with a logical spiral-curriculum approach. Key concepts are revisited and built upon, promoting deeper learning and understanding as the children progress. Built into the lesson structure, ‘Remember’ activities allow for spaced retrieval practice, regularly revisiting key concepts and knowledge at increasing intervals over time. The curriculum is carefully sequenced ensuring children are able to build on prior knowledge and make connections between this and new knowledge, broadening and deepening their schema. By systematically revisiting material, we promote children’s retention of knowledge and slow the rate of forgetting, making it easier to recall and apply knowledge in different contexts. This contributes to long-term retention and mastery.
  
• Staff will follow their curriculum maps to ensure there is progression throughout the school and lessons follow a sequence that is pertinent to the topic.
• To fulfil the duties of the National Curriculum whereby schools must provide a broad and balanced curriculum. We promote the spiritual, moral, social, cultural, development of pupils and prepare them for their responsibilities for later life. e.g. conservation.
• We will monitor progress regularly through book looks, evidence of work and discussions with the pupils. We will ensure that all staff are kept informed of any changes within the Geography curriculum and that best practice is shared. 
• To monitor children progress in Geography and how they apply their learning throughout the curriculum.
• To build a Geographical curriculum that endorses the importance of outdoor learning (fieldwork); to build a curiosity for learning. Fieldwork is a key pillar of our curriculum. An essential element of geographical education, fieldwork encourages children to apply their knowledge in real-world contexts, enhancing their learning experience and increasing motivation and interest. Our scheme includes regular fieldwork opportunities embedded within the curriculum, as well as more in-depth fieldwork enquiries in each year group. Through the development of their procedural knowledge and skills, children become strong geographical thinkers and are taught how to collect, present and analyse data.
• To provide all children with a balance of skills, key vocabulary and knowledge within a geographical context.
• Our scheme aims to develop strong critical thinking skills. The Geographical Association defines this as the ‘ability to question, think clearly and make reasoned judgements.’ Our scheme includes opportunities for children to develop these skills in each unit by encouraging children to question and analyse information, using it to solve problems and develop solutions.
• Another key aim of our scheme is to engender a deeper understanding and respect for our planet. Sir David Attenborough points out that, 'No one will protect what they don't care about; and no one will care about what they have never experienced.' Through the concept of ‘environment’, our scheme provides a curriculum that immerses children in the world and its wonders, encouraging a love for the natural world whilst also introducing them to some of the challenges faced by a world and its people impacted by climate change.

 Implementation

The scheme has been planned around:

3 key concepts:

·      place

·      environment

·      earth processes

6 organising concepts:

• space
• scale
• connections, similarities and differences
• diversity
• understanding different perspectives
• time 

•     Geowonderers scheme
  We use and adapt the new Geowonderers scheme. Subject leader has listened to feedback from teachers whilst ensuring complete National Curriculum coverage. The scheme helps teachers with expert subject knowledge, while building in a progression of knowledge and skills, and creating hands-on creative learning opportunities.
•     Knowledge Organisers
  Children have access to core knowledge, vocabulary and meanings to understand Geography and to use these skills across the curriculum. 
•     Knowledge/display walls
  Geography on Knowledge Walls throughout school focus on key knowledge, vocabulary and questions. These exemplify the terminology used throughout the teaching of Geography, British Values and SMSC, and enable pupils to make links across the wider curriculum. 
•     Recap prior learning
  At the beginning of each unit, teachers and pupils recap previous knowledge and skills learnt in prior modules to help them make connections and build on prior knowledge. At the beginning of each lesson, teachers and pupils recap prior knowledge, highlighting core knowledge and relevant fingertip knowledge. 
•     Subject specific and content specific vocabulary
  Identified through knowledge organisers and knowledge wall displays and highlighted to the children at the beginning of lessons. This vocabulary is revisited through class assemblies, ‘Quiz Its’ and ‘Check Its’. 
•     Outdoor Learning (fieldwork and enquiry)
  Teaching and learning should plan for outdoor learning opportunities in each year group. The purpose of each trip is to be clear. Children will become more aware of their local environment and as they progress through their geographical education they will use and build maps specific to their areas of enquiry. Maps of the UK and the World are positioned in various outdoor areas and playgrounds to help improve locational knowledge.
•     Assessment via Check Its, Quiz Its, and Sonar Tracker
  In Years 1-6, children complete a ‘Check It’. This is an interim assessment halfway through a topic. This assessment informs teaching for the rest of the unit to help ensure key knowledge and skills are learned. Children also complete ‘Quiz Its’. A ‘Quiz It’ is completed the term after that particular module finished to help children recap knowledge and to teacher assess what knowledge has been remembered. Children go through the quiz after its completion. Assessments are then inputted onto Sonar Tracker, our progress tracker system and moderated by subject leader and SLT. Assessment information is then analysed by teachers, subject leads and SLT to improve children’s future learning. 
•     Provision in new EYFS framework
  Reception curriculum is included in our progression framework and carefully planned for to ensure there is a combination of progression and revisited learning between Reception and Year One (for example through seasons and hot and cold places). Reception children are given a secure grounding in the Prime Areas of learning, ensuring they have a good foundation on which to build through the specific areas, including ‘Understanding The World’. Areas of provision are enhanced to ensure children are exposed to vocabulary and they are able to develop their understanding of the world and their local area. 
•     Access to resources
  Children will access resources to acquire learning through atlases, globes, text books, maps, digital technology, photographs and fieldwork equipment for example every class from Reception- Year Six have their own globes which are consistently used. 
•     British Values and PSHE
  Children will learn and revisit the importance of our world and how it should be treated through a range of cultural capital, experiences and themed weeks/days such as British Values week, Earth Day, Cultural Diversity Day, International Women’s Day, Environmental Week etc. 
•     Learning environment 
  The learning environment is designed to ensure children develop their geographical knowledge, and continue to know more, remember more and understand more. Knowledge walls and organisers are key drivers to this. Teachers make reference to them during lessons and at other regular times during the week.
•     Cultural Capital
  We plan visits, visitors, fieldwork and involvement in the community activity to provide first-hand experiences for the children to support and develop their learning. This is often linked to Geography.
•     Themed weeks/days with a Geography focus
  In order to implement our intention of exceeding the National curriculum we schedule themed weeks where the whole school focuses on an aspect of Geography. This includes celebrating; Environmental Week, British Values Week, World Cultural and Heritage day and Geography Week (where each year group focuses on a continent with clear progression through out the year groups). The latter aims to secure key knowledge in locational and place knowledge. 
•     Staff CPD
  We have informative CPD’s that develop the skills and knowledge of teaching staff. Where appropriate, this is shared with other schools within the borough while any knowledge gained from such meetings is brought back to the school. 

Impact 

•    Children will know more, remember more and understand more about Geography.
•    A culture of high expectations where pupil’s love of Geography can flourish. 
•    We allow children to fully immerse themselves in a Geography topic while minimising cognitive overload. 
•    The large majority of children will achieve age related expectation in Geography. 
•    Children will build their knowledge of Geographical strands including; locational knowledge (UK and the local area and the world and its continents), place knowledge (understanding differences and similarities between the UK and different places), physical themes, human themes and Geographical skills and enquiry (map and atlas work and fieldwork and investigation). 
•      Children should understand the relevance of geographical skills they are learning and how they can apply them to other areas of the National Curriculum. Children develop their knowledge and skills in each area of Geography over each year. 
•      As geographers, children will retain knowledge about geography with an appropriate context. Children will learn lessons that will influence the decisions they make in their lives in the future as active and responsible citizens. 
•    Children’s cultural capital will increase to help improve their life chances.
•    Children will work collaboratively to solve problems and explain the processes that they have observed within a real-life context.

The following Ofsted resources have been used to inform our scheme of work:

• Research review series: geography, June 2021
• Getting our bearings: the geography subject report, September 2023
• Geography Subject curriculum insights for primary and secondary teachers and leaders
• Our scheme has also been informed by the Geographical Association’s Curriculum Framework, 2022