An Overvew of Iceland 2013!

Iceland 2013

We will be adding a detailed account of the trip in the coming days, but for now enjoy these photos as some of our favourite moments! 

Summer of Success!

What an amazing summer of results we have had in the Geography Department! Firstly we must talk about our Year 13s and how well they did in their final school based exams! As a department 100% of students achieved a passing grade with over 64% of students gaining an A*-C and 22% with A* and A.

In particular we must mention those who are off to study Geography further at University.

David Smith - A* at Oxford University ]
Callum O'Neill - A at Loughborough University
Sophie Beattie - A at the University of Newcastle

and further mention to our other A grade students
Libby Franklin
Hannah Feld

The Year 12s have stepped up to the rigours of A level with the majority of the class hitting their targets and 88% of students achieving a passing grade. A big well done to Alice Sewell, Rachel Smithson and Lauren Murphy for getting top marks. The Year 11s have helped the Geography Department get their highest results for many years with 89.1% of students getting a passing grade of A*-C

Year 10s.... you have a lot to live up to!!

Improving Core Geography Knowledge

One of the most infuriating thing I hear as a Geography teacher is people saying that they have no idea where in the world where some places, countries, rivers or mountains are. Parents often say that they have to laugh when students say things like Africa is within Europe and that The Alps are in Scotland. In recent years we have seen a real push to make Geography more enjoyable and interesting to our students. This is great as we are now studying such topics as Geography of sport, crime or fashion which are interesting to our students. A level topics of Development, Globalisation and World Cities are really preparing students for the real world they are due to grow up within.

However,  surely at the core of all this we need to understand how these places fit with one another to fully understand how they relate. So this year we have decided to use homework time for our Year 7s to address this imbalance of what could be called Core Geographical Knowledge.

The document below is the homework booklet that Year 7 will receive in their first week at Arthur Terry. The basic principle is that they we are encouraging our students to improve their independent learning skills from the very start of Geography at Arthur Terry. It will also address a gap of 'core knowledge' that may currently exist in our KS3 scheme of work. In essence students will be creating their own Atlas over the two years. It also highlights the importance of homework, project work and times get students into the habit of revising and recalling information.



We are currently creating a similar project for the next two terms for Year 7 looking at Africa before moving on to North, Central and South America and if proves to be successful we will carry on into Year 8 too with Asia, Middle East and Oceania.

Hopefully this means our students wont grow up with knowledge like the lady in the video below!

"Unique" Geographical Tags

Today in Geography we had a go at designing our own Geographical Tags inspired by  Meshu after reading this article.

The lesson was really simple... all that the students had was a world map and an Atlas.

Their first task was to find 10 countries that were of interest to them. Some chose places they had been or just countries they wanted to visit in the future. They then drew a line from the UK to their first country of choice before going on to the second, third and so on. After their last destination country they return the line back to the UK and therefore completing their diagram. All the diagrams will be different as students have a complete free reign over which countries they visit along the way!

The diagrams were then cut out before moving on to a European map and a South American map.... a useful and fun way for students to interact with the locations of countries!

Looking forward, the same idea could be applied in the first few lessons back to introduce students to how an atlas works in Year 7 or maybe even to essay planning as a template.

Hopefully some photos to follow!!

Try it out!! It was great fun.

Mr. Simmons

Some summer homework....

Summer is over, but the Geography you can find is not... so below is list of easy things you can do over the holidays to keep your geographical brains ticking over until September!

Year 7 – On the way to visit a place/attraction during the holidays, use a road map to track your journey. Highlight what you might see on the way paying particular attention to physical and human features of the landscape.

 

Year 8 – Create a collage or diary noting down any news stories or TV programs that you have watched over the summer that can link to Geography. Consider the 5Ws – What happened? Where did it happen? Why did it occur? Who was affected? When did it happen?

 

Year 9 – In preparation for studying extreme environments, watch programs such as Bear Grylls and Ray Mears or read books with a similar theme, and think about people’s experiences of these environments and how they have adapted to living in them.

 

Year 10 –While visiting a tourist attraction (this can be from Birmingham city centre to The Bahamas), reflect on the advantages and disadvantages tourists can have on the area. This will prepare you for the tourism module you will begin studying in September.

 

Year 11 – Using the internet, research how to carry out fieldwork techniques such as land use surveys and environmental surveys; and their advantages and disadvantages. Also practice your data presentation skills (in particular producing high quality graphs) using Microsoft Excel. Both of these will help you in the controlled assessment.

Have a great break everyone.... see you in September!!

Dorset Review!