Geography

At Rainford CE, we believe that Geography helps to provoke and answer questions about the natural and human worlds, encouraging children to build knowledge and understanding of their world and their place in it. It helps to develop a range of investigative and problem-solving skills that are transferable to other curriculum areas and which can be used to promote children’s spiritual, moral, social and cultural development.

When our pupils study the characteristics of our natural world, they build on their knowledge and understanding of geographical formations and features while nurturing their appreciation for God’s creation through awe and wonder.

Geography is, by nature, an investigative subject, which develops an understanding of concepts, knowledge and skills. We seek 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; to promote children’s interest and understanding about diverse places, people, resources and natural and human environments, together with a deep understanding of the Earth’s key physical and human processes.

In Key Stage 1, children will develop their knowledge about the United Kingdom and their own locality. They will learn how to use maps, atlases and globes as well as learning simple compass directions. The children will also study seasonal and daily weather patterns in the United Kingdom and look at the hot and cold areas of the world in relation to the equator and the North and South Poles.

In Key Stage 2, pupils will extend their knowledge to beyond their local area and will study Europe as well as North and South America. They will begin to look at similarities and differences of human geography such as types of settlement and land use. They will also study physical geography elements such as climate zones, rivers, mountains, volcanoes and earthquakes. Children will continue to use maps, atlases and globes and will use the 8 points of the compass in their work. They will start to consider the use of four and six figure grid references and ordinance survey maps.

By revisiting these areas of learning regularly and building geographical skills through classroom work and fieldwork, pupils will remember more, know more and understand more. As pupils make progress, their growing knowledge about the world should help them to deepen their understanding of the interaction between physical and human processes, and of the formation and use of landscapes and environments.

The curriculum content is sequenced to build learning over time- the content is planned and sequenced so that knowledge and skills build on prior learning and towards clearly defined end points; curriculum content supports subsequent learning: within lessons, lesson sequences, topics, years and phases curriculum; planning identifies small enough component steps; and known gaps in knowledge and skills are addressed in the sequencing of lesson content.

The National Curriculum provides the structure and skill development for our Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2 geography curriculum, whilst the Early Learning Goals provide the structure and skill development for EYFS pupils. Our school curriculum currently follows a two-year cycle and each cycle has been planned to ensure progression within and across phases. This is now changing in Key Stage 1 to reflect the current schooling needs of our local community. Year 1 pupils (academic year 2021-2022) will be taught the elements of geography from the National Curriculum relating to the local environment, rather than follow our previous Key Stage 1 cycle. In 2022-2023, all of Key Stage 1 will move away from the cyclical units and be taught as separate year groups for geography as there will no longer be a need for the two-year cycle in this subject for our school. Year 2 will focus on the UK and wider world.

Our geography curriculum has been designed to ensure that all children across the two-year cycle are taught the National Curriculum objectives through a skills-based curriculum which has clear progression between year groups and key stages. We have created medium-term planning with key knowledge, subject-specific vocabulary and geographical skills clearly mapped out to allow teaching to focus on delivering high-quality, interesting geography lessons which are appropriately differentiated for the needs of each class. Cross-curricular links with English, science and history are also clearly highlighted on the geography curriculum mapping to ensure that we exploit all possible opportunities to deepen learning by making those explicit links across subjects.

To ensure that pupils retain key geographical knowledge and vocabulary, vocabulary has been mapped out across all year groups and this has been used to create high quality knowledge organisers. We have implemented the use of knowledge organisers, key knowledge mind maps and unit quizzes. Teachers create detailed knowledge organisers for each geography topic containing subject-specific vocabulary, key knowledge, book recommendations and an outline of what they have learned previously which will help them in their new learning. Pupils also complete key knowledge mind maps for each geography unit; they add any prior knowledge to this at the start of the unit using a coloured pencil and then they build up key knowledge around this at the beginning of each lesson. Unit quizzes have been implemented to allow us to evidence long-term memory of key concepts and vocabulary.

 

Long term planning

 

 

Autumn

Spring

Summer

Preschool

 

NW- Describe a familiar route.(link to posting letter and walking to village) 

NW- rubbish, recycling and looking after their environment- Sea pollution 

Know that there are different countries in the world.

Explore the countries different types of bears come from 

Know the difference between land and sea on a map.

Reception

Marvellous Me (local area)

NW- locate features of their local area on a map 

Observe local features

Ticket to Ride (different environments)

learn how environments are different and compare to Rainford. Make observational drawings of the church and the church garden. 

Observe and talk about the changes in weather / local environment during spring. 

God’s Wonderful World (UK compared with Africa)

Similarities and differences between life in this country and life in Africa 

Identify on a map where the UK is and to know we live in this country 

Year 1

Introduction to human and physical features

Human and physical geography

Our school

Geographical skills & fieldwork

Our local area (Rainford)

Geographical skills & fieldwork

Year 2

UK

Locational knowledge

Geographical skills

Continents and oceans

Locational knowledge

Geographical skills

Lake District compared with Amazon

Place knowledge

Geographical skills & fieldwork

Year 3

UK

Locational knowledge

Human and physical geography

Geographical skills & fieldwork

Water cycle & rivers

Human and physical geography

Year 4

Europe

Locational knowledge

Human and physical geography

Geographical skills and fieldwork

Europe comparison (North West region of England compared with mainland Greece with a focus on Athens)

Place knowledge

Volcanoes and earthquakes

Human and physical geography

UKS2

Cycle 2

North America

Locational knowledge

North America comparison (Scotland region compared with Greenland region)

Place knowledge

Local geography

Geographical skills & fieldwork

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