Geography Teaching Team: Miss S. Clare - Subject Leader for Geography | E-Mail |
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Welcome to Humanities
The Humanities Faculty at Cantell Maths and Computing College consists of a hard working, well-qualified and very friendly group of teachers who want the Humanities subjects to be seen as lively and exciting. We are proud of the way we work together as a team, sharing good practice and writing schemes of work together in departments and supporting each other. We aspire to be at the forefront of developing the use of new teaching and learning strategies to enhance student progress. This combines to make the Humanities Faculty a very stimulating and enjoyable place to work and learn.
The Humanities Faculty comprises Religious Education, Geography, History, Classical Civilisation and Latin. Individual subjects are important in their own right, but the faculty identity is developing into a strong one.
The different members of the Faculty offer a wide range of skills, interests and experiences. Some staff teach in more than one subject area of the Faculty. The range of interests and personalities in the Humanities team ensure that we enjoy a stimulating and lively working atmosphere.
“It is not just a matter of helping students to obtain qualifications and a career with some emotional value added on, but of helping them to find passions and enthusiasms, drawing on their inner resources so that they have these to rely on whatever life brings, nurturing a sense of purpose and motivating a vision”.
Ofsted Inspector
In the Humanities Faculty, we aim to develop an enthusiastic, progressive and challenging learning environment for all students. We shall do this by providing interesting and stimulating lessons using a range of engaging teaching and learning styles, both inside and outside the classroom. We shall enable students to investigate and understand the world’s past and present, in order to make them better citizens and decision-makers for the future.
We aim to develop learners who have a sense of awe and wonder about the natural world around us; tolerance and support for others; and the ability to understand and celebrate the incredibly rich cultural and ethnic diversity of our fantastic school community and the wider world around us.
We aim todevelop and extend students’ understanding of the world and its diversity; make a significant contribution to students’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development; help students to understand their roots as individuals and as members of larger social groups, whatever their ethnic and cultural background; help students to come to terms with their own hopes, fears, beliefs and achievements by seeing them in the wider context of the hopes, fears, beliefs and achievements of other people, past and present.
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The Humanities Faculty Vision
To be an Outstanding Faculty for Teaching and Learning.
To encourage lifelong learning throughout the Faculty (students & staff).
To provide a relevant and engaging curriculum to meet the needs of all students.
To achieve and celebrate progression as well as attainment for all students.
To be secure in our judgements of our students’ progression and attainment.
To instil engagement, participation and curiosity at the heart of everything we do so that learning extends beyond the classroom.
To foster a climate of support and challenge across the Faculty (staff and students) to ensure that together everyone achieves more.
We strive to help students to achieve their full potential and as a Faculty we take pride in the progress the school continues to make.
Mrs Claire May-Smith
Faculty Leader for Humanities
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Subject Overview:
Geography: Evidence shows that students who study geography through their school lives become some of the most employable people in society.
Geography as a subject is staggering, from designing sustainable eco-cities of the future, to limpets undermining the White Cliffs of Dover, to the settlement of retired British people in Spain and Italy, as well as more traditional aspects such as volcanoes, glaciers and earthquakes.
Geography is often described as ‘…the study of the world, its people and the interactions between the two.’
Geography has a distinctive contribution to make to the development and understanding of the world and its peoples and helps us understand the relationships between people and the environment. It instils in students a sense of place and makes them more aware of the fact that the world in which we live is likely to change more in the next fifty years than it has ever done before. They are given a firm understanding of their world, the effect they have on it and they become aware of their responsibilities to the planet from a young age.
As a subject, Geography bridges the gap between the Arts and Sciences and builds cross-curricular links between a range of subjects including Biology, Maths and Religious Studies. It deals with some of the major contemporary issues such as inequalities between nations, problems of rapid population growth, environmental pollution and sustainable resource management.
The Geography KS3 curriculum is focused around ‘Big Questions’. These include: How to read standard OS maps as well as other map types; Why do natural disasters like earthquakes & Volcanoes happen? Where do people live and why? Globalisation and the Fashion Industry: How the earth is getting ‘smaller’? What happens to a river from source to mouth? : How we can exploit the resources available on earth without affecting the future? These are only a few examples of our exciting enquiry-based scheme of study.
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Learning Experience:
In designing and selecting our courses we aim to give the students at Cantell an understanding of human and physical environments, the interactions between the two, and an appreciation Geographical issues from a variety of viewpoints. At all key stages we use a variety of resources and draw on recent case studies wherever possible. These are updated, as events occur to demonstrate the contemporary nature, relevance and importance of the subject.
Geography lessons are designed to involve the students actively in tasks, and encourage them to think and learn independently. Activities range from analysing sources such as maps, photographs and news articles, to group role-plays, presentations and model making. We aim to provide a range of learning experiences within each scheme of work to take advantage of the strengths of as many students as possible. Additional opportunities such as Booster Classes and GCSE query surgeries are provided at various points during the academic year.
We also offer a range of field trips to support learning in the classroom. At Key Stage 3, these are day trips to investigate a particular question or issue in the local area. Years 10 and 11 take part in field work looking at the Dorset/Hampshire coastline.
Geography: In year 8 students receive eight fifty minute lessons a fortnight with 1 Humanities teacher teaching both History and Geography. In year 9, students receive four fifty minute lessons a fortnight.
Geography GCSE: This course is currently being offered in two ways. Firstly, it’s run as a two year course with three lessons a week in the traditional way.
We also offer the same course as a one year GCSE; this means that students attend six lessons of Geography a week resulting in a fast paced exciting course. For both courses; two pieces of Controlled Assessment (an investigation and a fieldwork study) are completed accounting for 25% of the final grade are required. The first examination paper is a problem solving exercise (DME worth 25%). The final examination paper accounts for the remaining 50% of the final grade.
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Homework and additional learning:
At KS3, students can be set smaller pieces of work to extend classroom learning, such as newspaper reports or additional research. At other times students are set extended project home works that link to the topic being studied for a six week period. Students are expected to manage their own time and learn to meet the deadlines set for the end of the unit of study. Projects range from designing cities of the future and mapping the contented of your fridge to research for class assessments or completing topic specific challenge booklets.
At Ks4, students are set weekly homework tasks. These take the nature of exam questions, research, preparation for guided learning and revision. This homework can be graded in accordance with GCSE mark schemes so that students can see where they are in their learning, and where they need to go to improve.
KS3 and KS4 enrichment reading lists can be found on the website. These lists give advice on fiction and non-fiction books that students may find interesting in relation to the topics they are studying.
Assessment:
Written and oral responses to class work and homework; timed essays, enquiries and regular tests / assessments using National Curriculum levels.
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Course Outline:
Geography allows the students to develop the skills they need to explore the world in which they live including their local surroundings. Students are taught to describe and explain the relationships between the physical and human elements of the environment. They analyse their effect on the world and the people within it, developing their understanding of globalisation and its implications for our future.
Year 7 Units:
Please refer to the Year 7 area of the website
Year 8 Units:
Key map skills: How to read standard OS maps as well as other map types.
The Home Region: Learning about our local area out to the whole of the British Isles, Earthquakes & Volcanoes: Causes, effects and responses to these types of natural hazards.
Settlement: Where people live and why.
Rivers & Flooding: The processes of rivers from source to mouth as well as responses to flood events.
Year 9 Units:
Crime: The geography of crime and mapping crime in an area, Globalisation and the Fashion Industry: How the earth is getting 'smaller' and fashion and business are becoming international.
Economic Development: The effects of industry and industrialisation
Weather & Climate: Measuring the weather, UK weather and forecasting.
Ecosystems: Study of certain special ecosystems and how flora and fauna interact.
Sustainability: How we can exploit the resources available on earth without affecting the future.
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Student Groupings:
Set according to Humanities (Geography, History, RE) teaching groups.
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Time Allocation:
4 lessons per two week cycle for Geography, 4 lessons per two week cycle for History and 2 lessons per week for Religious Education.
GEOGRAPHY GCSE (2 year option)
Assessment Requirements
All are expected to attend the field trip.
Two pieces of coursework (an investigation and a fieldwork study) are completed accounting for 25% of the final grade.
The first examination paper is a problem solving exercise (DME worth 25%) and is taken in the June of Year 10.
The final examination paper accounts for the remaining 50% of the final grade.
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Course Outline
Over the course of two years students will complete 4 units of study and 2 pieces of coursework
Students start Year 10 looking at Physical Systems and Environment, before moving on to Natural Hazards and then Economic Development. The DME is completed in the summer term, and the fieldwork in the first half of the autumn term of year 11. Students conclude year 11 with Population and Settlement.
Prior to Easter Students will begin revision.
During Year 10 and 11 two pieces of coursework are completed. The investigation will be done in the autumn term of year 10. The field trip to the Dorset / Hants Coast will be conducted during the autumn term of Year 11. The coursework is written up in lesson time within the new framework whereby all coursework is to be completed under “controlled conditions”.
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Expectations
All work should be completed to the best of their ability.
Students are expected to take pride in their work, to be fully prepared for each lesson, to take an active part in discussions, respect other people’s opinions, be prepared to change their minds and to use key geographical terminology in their answers.
We expect students to use the VLE for homework, projects and subject related areas of interest
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Career Opportunities
Geography develops so many skills that it can be beneficial to whatever career path you choose to take, i.e. numerical analysis, data interpretation, extended writing of a scientific nature, constructing graphs.
Extra curricular activities relevant to this subject
The Duke of Edinburgh award uses and develops many geographical skills and techniques (available to Year 10 students)
Entering competitions e.g. Ordnance Survey National Quiz
Revision and coursework sessions when needed
Geography is also available as a one-year option. This course is identical to the 2 year course in content but is delivered as 6 lessons per week over the course of one year.
