Intent

Through our Geography curriculum, we aim to expand geographical vocabulary, increase our children’s knowledge and curiosity of the wider world and promote high aspirations. We seek to create a life-long love of the subject, through teaching our children about diverse places, people and resources. Through the study of natural and human environments, as well as physical and human processes, our desire is to provide our children with a sense of awe and wonder about the world they live in.

As they continue on their journey of Geography, we aim to foster a deep understanding of the subject that develops alongside their geographical skills. Our aim is that our children go on to apply these skills across all subjects, as well as in their futures beyond primary school.

Our curriculum is designed to provide our children with the subject-specific language they need to describe, question and discuss the world, as well as their place in it. Our pupils are encouraged to recognise that they have a voice and to use it confidently to debate topics that they feel passionate about, for example, deforestation or renewable energy. We aim to produce well- rounded individuals by providing our children with opportunities to expand their cultural capital and experiences of the world.

Implement

Based upon the National Curriculum and the individual needs of our children, we have created a Geography progression map, which sets out the objectives taught in each year group. Geography is taught as part of our two-year cycle for each age phase. We alternate our Geography and History topics ensuring that our children receive a well-rounded teaching of the humanities subjects throughout the year. At times, we take the opportunity to create links between the two subjects to help solidify the learning taking place.

Teachers use questioning and provide opportunities for discussion and investigation to support the development of vocabulary, which is explicitly taught and modelled by teachers in every lesson. Key geographical knowledge and language (such as, the name and location of continents, countries, capital cities and oceans) is revisited frequently, to make learning memorable, relevant and easy to retrieve.

We support learning with trips to inspire our children and widen their cultural experiences. For instance, our Year 3/4 rainforest learning involves a visit to ‘The Living Rainforest’.

Impact

The impact of our Geography curriculum is measured in a variety of ways: questioning during lesson time, marking children’s written work, listening to child-led discussion, interviewing pupils across the school about their learning, book looks and using images/videos of children’s practical learning.

By end of the Geography curriculum at our schools, our children will:

  • Have a growing knowledge of the world and their place in it.
  • Have a wider vocabulary of geographical terms.
  • Aspire to discover more about the world, through reading, travel or the media.
  • Know that they can use their voice to express themselves and their opinions.
  • Develop their geographical skills, such as, evaluation, creativity, problem solving and enquiry.