At Horniman School we enable pupils to become first-rate geographers through the development of the children’s geographical knowledge, understanding and skills. We develop this through the use of geographical sources, observations, understanding about diverse places, people and natural and human environments. As pupils progress, they will gain a deeper awareness of the Earth’s key physical and human processes. Our teaching will equip pupils to build upon their curiosity and fascination about the world and its people. Children gain the geographical skills of identifying locations, human and physical features and developing locational and place knowledge.
EYFS
In Reception we believe that geographers should:
In reception this is taught throughout all topics.
In Key Stage 1 we believe geographers should:
We teach this through the topics of:
Key Stage 1
Knowledge, opportunities and contexts
Locational knowledge
Y1 – Weather, Seaside
Y2 - Kenya, Bread from around the world
Place knowledge
Y1 –Spain seaside holidays
Y2 –A village in Kenya/Forest Hill
Human and physical geography
Y1 – Weather, Spain seaside holidays
Y2 – A village in Kenya/Forest Hill
In Key Stage 2 we believe geographers should gain the following skills:
We teach this through the topics of:
· Animals and Living things
· Wonderful World
· Rivers
· Spain
· Brazil
· Fair trade
· Contrasting location
Thinking geographically offers a uniquely powerful way of seeing the world and makes connections between scales, from the local to the global. We need facts in order to think, but we also need concepts to enable us to group bits of information, or facts, together.
The main organising concepts of geography are place, space, environment and scale.
§Space - the location of points, features or regions in absolute and /or relative terms and the relationships, flows and patterns that connect and / or define them. This includes knowledge of locating countries, continents, key physical human and physical features on map, globes and aerial photographs.
§Place – what it is like there, what happens there and how and why it is changing. This involves looking at human and physical features, how they change over time, and comparing and contrasting different localities.
§Environment – describing and understanding key geographical features of physical and human geography, using geographical vocabulary. For example, weather patterns, volcanoes, water cycle, land use, types of settlement etc.
§Scale - the 'zoom lens' that enables us to view places from global to local levels.
A local scale study is the area in which people live their everyday lives. This will be the school grounds and the local area. In contrast, a geographical region is generally a large area of land with distinguishing geographical, ecological, cultural or political characteristics that set it apart from other areas and may exist within one country or be spread over several.
Fieldwork
Fieldwork is a valuable aspect of geography that helps to motivate pupils and also raises standards of attainment . It is incorporated into the curriculum whenever possible, for example, measuring rainfall or studying different habitats in the school grounds to investigating rivers by wading through Deptford Creek.