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Moving on up. Suggestions for easing transition between the Key Stages. Victoria Ellis and Becky Kitchen Members of the Secondary Phase Committee.
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Moving on up Suggestions for easing transition between the Key Stages Victoria Ellis and Becky Kitchen Members of the Secondary Phase Committee
“How strange that the nature of life is change, yet the nature of human beings is to resist change. And how ironic that the difficult times we fear might ruin us are the very ones that can break us open and help us blossom into who we were meant to be.” Elizabeth Lesser
Please sit on the table of the transition that you are most familiar with / would like to know more about. What should a geographer at this stage look like? What skills do they have?
A focus on transition can act as important evidence for the Secondary Geography Quality Mark Centre of Excellence http://www.geography.org.uk/11-19/secondaryqualitymark/applyingfortheaward/
Recognise that: • Students will have very different experiences of geography at primary school. • Some have had lessons with • a subject specialist, others • have done geography as part • of ‘topic’ work with non • specialists. • Yet their ‘big picture’, their • macro-knowledge of • geography is defined before • they secondary school. Teaching Geography Spring 2013
Know what the KS2 curriculum is! https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-curriculum-in-england-geography-programmes-of-study
Visit primary feeders and talk to the geography co-ordinator and some of the pupils.
Host an INSET session for primary colleagues – Digimap opportunity
Create or teach a transition unit which can be started at the end of Year 6 and continued into Year 7. http://givegeographyitsplace.blogspot.co.uk/
Start Year 7 with a ‘What is Geography?’ unit Welcome to our world. Welcome to geography
…and for the pupils? Give them a label with school address and ask them to send a postcard from their summer holidays.
Teach structured extended geographical writing at KS3. For example, in a unit on South Africa pupils write an essay: ‘Is South Africa a microcosm of the world?’
Teach GCSE style units at KS3 (but not as a GCSE) and use the GCSE textbooks to structure them.
Teach a ‘Geographical Futures’ unit which looks at the global futures (What will the world be like in 2050?) and their future (What type of geographer are you? How will you use geography in the future?)
Start Year 10 with a couple of lessons from the Geography Teaching Today Glastonbury unit to recap map skills. http://www.rgs.org/OurWork/Schools/Teaching+resources/Key+Stage+3+resources/Mapping+festivals/Glastonbury+Tour.htm
Invite some RGS Geography Ambassadors in to enthuse and inform students. http://www.rgs.org/OurWork/Schools/Careers+and+Further+Study/Promoting+and+supporting+geography+in+your+school+or+college/Geography+Ambassador+scheme.htm
Do some fieldwork – even if it is just in the school grounds…
Set reading tasks in preparation for lessons or extended writing.
Put your lesson notes and resources onto Edmodo / extranet https://www.edmodo.com/
Have a group of Geography Learning Leaders who can buddy student from younger years / help with Open Evening / run Geography Club etc.
Create a guide to study geography at university which includes reasons for studying geography, short descriptions of quality geography courses and their typical offers and bios of geography staff about their experience of geography at university.
Organise a library visit and set an assignment requiring independent reading and research.
Encourage your students to do the Extended Project Qualification (EPQ). http://www.aqa.org.uk/programmes/aqa-baccalaureate/extended-project/the-aqa-epq
Invite ex-students who have done Geography at university back to give talks and run workshops with Sixth Form students