At Janet Duke Primary School, geography lessons aim to inspire our pupils’ curiosity and fascination about the world which will remain with them for the rest of their lives.  Geography teaching also motivates children to find out about the physical world and enables them to recognise the importance of sustainable development.  It encourages children to consider human geography and how people live around the world.  It helps them to make sense of their surroundings by exploring their immediate environment in the context of their own locality, other contrasting localities, Europe and the World.

Foundation Stage Within the Early Years Foundation Stage, we encourage the development of skills, knowledge and understanding in the EYFS area of ‘Understanding the World’. Geography makes a significant contribution to the Early Learning Goals (ELGs) of enhancing the understanding of the world through: asking questions, talking about some of the things they have observed, such as plants, animals, natural and found objects, showing care and concern for living things and the environment and examining photographs, simple maps and visiting local places.

Year 1 children are taught Geography under the following topics: Where we live and our school, Safari in Africa, Tropical Rainforests

Year 2 children are taught Geography under the following topics: The Polar Regions, Asia/ China, Our Local Area and Deserts.

Year 3 children are taught Geography under the following topics: Mountains and Weather, Australia, Local Area study and Tundra Biome.

Year 4 children are taught Geography under the following topics: All Around the World, Weather/ Rivers, City-Coast, Local Area Study: Chelmsford and Savannah biome.

Year 5 children are taught Geography under the following topics: South America, Yosemite National Park and Aquatic Biome.

Year 6 children are taught Geography under the following topics: Windrush and St. Lucia, California, Coastlines and Taiga Biome.

Each topic is carefully planned to ensure correct pitch and challenge, taking into consideration the achievement statements originally outlined from the National Curriculum. The local area studies are repeated several times throughout the school, gradually broadening the scope of learning and continuously building on prior knowledge and skills.

At the beginning of every topic, a unit plan is produced that details the objectives for each unit, practical work that will be completed, key vocabulary, models, diagrams and key questioning. These are working documents and are adapted as per the needs of the children. We feel that child led learning is extremely important and therefore try to follow the children’s direction wherever possible whilst still achieving our objectives. Teachers plan individual lessons using a range of different schemes of resources to ensure that lessons are as engaging and exciting as possible for our children.

Displays

All classes have a Topic display, where the key vocabulary for each topic is displayed for the children to use in their work. Each display aims to provide interactive activities for the children to take part in as well as promoting examples of work produced by the children. This can include photocopies of work taken from books. Key questions are generated from planning and evident on display for children which helps assess children’s learning and support retrieval of information.