Thursday 7 December 2006

Meeting with Wakefield Primary Geography Coordinators


I would like to say a big thank you to the 15 Wakefield Geography Coordinators who attended yesterdays meeting about school self evaluation and the use of the Primary Geography Quality Mark. The meeting was very enjoyable and people contributed with great enthusaism. It was good to catch up with so many friendly faces.


Looking ahead to the next meeting, on the afternoon of February 14th at Woolley Hall, teachers identified aspects of geography that they are working on now and things they would like to work on next. I thought I could share their ideas through this blog. There seems to be two core groups of interest - those who are focused on developing policy, reviewing schemes of work etc. and those who would like to focus more on cross-curricular approaches and making sure the curriculum is more creative and fun. These do not seem to me to be mutually exclusive and it would be good to try and think how these link together in our next session. If anyone would like to contribute to this discussion - please post your comments below.


What are you working on now?
Developing the use of the Outdoor classroom for KS1
Exciting ideas for IWB’s
How to record monitoring of planning & children’s learning
Review policy & SoW using PGQM – use key indicators to audit with members of staff
Build up appropriate resources
Finalising geog policy for amalgamated school & reviewing resources
Curriculum review – allocation/ re-allocation of topics and resources
Trying to give geography a higher status – reclaim it as part of a broad & balanced curriculum.
Make it fun & exciting.
Develop cross-curricular themes.
Promote Speaking & Listening, use more role-play
Free up time to spend on Geog.
Extend resources
A file of places to visit in Yorkshire
Review geog policy
Audit resources
Skills based learning
Develop a more creative/ cross-curricular approach in KS1
Raising standards & attainment (Core?)
Skills/ fieldwork
More flexible approach – linked to other subjects – making geog fun
Investigations in geog, higher order thinking, G & T in Geog

What are you keen to work on next?
An outdoor maths trail
Update policy
Monitor effectiveness of geography in school
Scrutiny of work + Lesson observations and evaluation
Develop a ` World Week’
Update resources and teaching materials
Develop local aspects of hist/ geog
Use school facilities to enhance geog curriculum
Cross- curric initiatives
Subscribe GA
Meetings with colleagues
- discuss/ develop geog teaching
- scrutinise & level work
X-curricular opportunities
Creativity theme weeks etc


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