What we believe for our curriculum (Intent)

Geography Education at Holbrook allows children to develop excellent knowledge, skills and understanding, to ensure they gain a better understanding of the world around them. Geography helps children make sense of their own surroundings, through learning about their own locality and the interaction between people and their environment. As their learning progresses, they gain a better understanding of the world, knowing their locality first and then making conceptual connections with locations all over the world. Our aim is for children to develop an interest in the world, developing an appreciation of ethnic, cultural and economic diversity. We want children to develop the skills necessary to carry out effective geographical enquiry, to be inquisitive and intrigued about the world whilst learning to think geographically. Our aim is also for children to develop a sense of responsibility towards the environment and an understanding of the human impact on the natural world. 

The substantive elements of the geography curriculum have been organised at Holbrook under the following areas:

• Locational knowledge
• Place knowledge
• Human and physical processes
•  Geographical skills
•  

Pupils will develop their understanding of where major cities, countries, continents and seas are located through building up this knowledge more each year. They will use a variety of maps, globes and digital software, such as Digimaps, to respect the concept of scale how it can be used in different ways. Pupils will learn about their locality and other areas planned into their learning in order for the children to make comparisons with places all over the world and to learn about a range of human and physical processes.

What we believe for our curriculum (Intent)

Geography Education at Holbrook allows children to develop excellent knowledge, skills and understanding, to ensure they gain a better understanding of the world around them. Geography helps children make sense of their own surroundings, through learning about their own locality and the interaction between people and their environment. As their learning progresses, they gain a better understanding of the world, knowing their locality first and then making conceptual connections with locations all over the world. Our aim is for children to develop an interest in the world, developing an appreciation of ethnic, cultural and economic diversity. We want children to develop the skills necessary to carry out effective geographical enquiry, to be inquisitive and intrigued about the world whilst learning to think geographically. Our aim is also for children to develop a sense of responsibility towards the environment and an understanding of the human impact on the natural world. -

The substantive elements of the geography curriculum have been organised at Holbrook under the following areas:

• Locational knowledge
• Place knowledge
• Human and physical processes
•  Geographical skills

Pupils will develop their understanding of where major cities, countries, continents and seas are located through building up this knowledge more each year. They will use a variety of maps, globes and digital software, such as Digimaps, to respect the concept of scale how it can be used in different ways. Pupils will learn about their locality and other areas planned into their learning in order for the children to make comparisons with places all over the world and to learn about a range of human and physical processes.

How we put our aims into daily practice (Implementation)

We have written a geography curriculum that is matched to the statutory requirements of the National Curriculum and capitalises upon the geographical features of our school setting.  These factors have been used in the creation of our bespoke progression of skills, knowledge and vocabulary in our geography curriculum.  Teachers sometimes also use various scheme of work to support their planning, which fit in best with the objectives each term. We use Digimaps online mapping software to further aid with the delivery of the curriculum and to utilise Geographical Information Systems (GIS).

Geography units are planned through the River of Knowledge termly themes. Years 1/2, years 3/4 and years 5/6 usually explore the same topic, with different objectives to echo the high expectations of learning for each year group. This provides the opportunity for joint fieldwork, and sharing of planning and ideas to inspire children. Geography is taught weekly for half of each term, usually alternating half termly between Geography and History. This is to facilitate children’s deeper understanding of a geography area of learning, with longer geography sessions to deepen learning and provide enough time for fieldwork and exploration. It is also to facilitate building upon pupils’ prior learning and support recall of knowledge, skills and facts, built upon over the course of the half term. When geography is taught, History ‘flashbacks’ are used in class at the beginning of every lesson. This demands pupils recall of what they have learnt previously, from their prior year groups.

Wherever possible, a range of quality literary books are linked to their geography learning and children have opportunities to write in cross-curricular contexts, for example in English.  Class teachers refer to Progression of skills grids (that reflect the National Curriculum programs of study) to ensure appropriate coverage across phases. Bespoke medium term outlines are produced for each geography topic area to ensure that intended knowledge that we want children to embed into their long-term memory is carefully selected.

We are successful because (Impact)

The Geography Subject Lead, the Geography Subject Governor and the Executive Head Teacher regularly check that teaching approaches match the intended curriculum goals for pupils. Resources and activities are well sequenced to support and promote progress for all children, following high quality teaching ‘and feedback to support children’s progression in the lesson and long term. We will know if our curriculum intent and implementation has been effective, if intended knowledge has been successfully embedded in pupils’ long term memory. Class teachers make summative assessments at the end of each term to establish what learning children have remembered.

Within our broad and balanced curriculum, Holbrook strive to ensure that every pupil, irrelevant of their needs, develops a passion for learning about and understanding our world, thus developing a love of geography. We aim to plan opportunities for geographical fieldwork as children gain so much from these trips that they cannot experience in the classroom alone. Many of these trips are in the local area, as encourage links to the local community, but out of the ordinary trips are planned at least once a year and are usually linked to geography in some way.