Shavington Academy

Geography Department

Curriculum Leader

Mr R Clowes

Our Geography curriculum at Shavington aims to develop the character of our pupils through the Shavington Values which are interwoven into both our classroom learning and our extra-curricular opportunities. We aim to support pupils academic progress alongside their journey to become global citizens.

We start embedding knowledge and skills from day one of year 7, working through topics such as international development, climate change, and hazards. Our fantastic GCSE course builds on the knowledge developed in KS3 and provides us with opportunities to create expert geographer. We run out of school fieldtrips within our curriculum and as extracurricular opportunities.

These trips broaden the horizons of our pupils and develops their understanding of the world even further. Our geography curriculum is built on the values of kindness and respect for other people, cultures and the environment whilst studying how we affect the world and how the world affects us.

Fieldtrips

The Geography department understand the value and learning opportunities provided by field work undertaken outside the classroom.

We complete two field work trips as part of our GCSE curriculum, one to Birmingham and one to a river in the Peak District.

How parents can support their child

Parents and carers have a huge part to play in maximising the progress made in Geography:

Ask them questions about what they are studying in Geography
Support with revision
Ensure your child has the correct equipment – pen / pencil / ruler
Support with homework
Read the news and discuss current affairs at home
Have a world map / globe / atlas at home and encourage looking at it, engaging with it

Feedback and Assessment

KS3 – Pupils will sit progressive assessments at three key points throughout the year and these will be formally assessed. Progress is monitored regularly throughout the year through structured responsive assessments, knowledge quizzes, a range of classroom learning activities and homework tasks.

KS4 – We follow the Edexcel B Geography Specification and pupils sit the following written examinations at the end of Year 11. To support this, pupils will be assessed through progressive and responsive assessments through KS4 and will complete a mock exam in both Year 10 and Year 11.

Component 1 – Global Geographical Issues – 37.5%
Component 2 – UK Geographical Issues – 37.5%
Component 3 – People and Environment Issues – 25%

Stretch and Challenge in Geography

Pupils are consistently encouraged to challenge themselves within Geography. There are challenge activities included in all lessons and opportunities for pupils to excel and push themselves.

Pupils are taught the key concepts and core knowledge which will support them understanding a wide range of contemporary geographic issues. Embedding this core allows our curriculum to be broad and balanced to explore geographic topics which will give pupils the skills to understand how the world works and their place in it.

Our curriculum supports all learners through scaffolding tasks to enable all pupils to make progress and understand core knowledge, whilst pushing pupils to be ambitious and complete challenge tasks to expand their geographic knowledge.

Following assessments we complete feedback tasks in line with specific action points to improve pupils attainment, giving them the opportunity to show resilience and ambition to develop their knowledge and skills further.