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Geography Unit 1 - Around our school - the local area.

Home page for unit.

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Some sample video for unit - see relevant page for rest of videos

 

QCA Suggestions.

This is a ‘long’ unit. It uses investigative tasks to introduce children to the idea of looking at their local area. The local area will be studied frequently during a child’s time in primary school and therefore this unit focuses on aspects of local features, land use and environment.

The unit offers links to literacy, mathematics, speaking and listening, design and technology, history, IT and the world of work.

How this unit links to Agriculture.

This unit in looking at the local area including the land use and environment obviously covers the use of land for farming as well as forests and the countryside, which have close links to land which is farmed. The videos are not meant to replace the field work involved in this unit but to support it and serve as an additional resource which is available each lesson as required. If your local area has specific habitats you feel should be looked at then examples of these may be available on the habitats section of this site - go to HABITATS which has links to science

If you are a village or rural school then you are not far from land used for farming. You may even have a farm in the village or have perhaps visited a farm on a school trip. Even if this is the case the videos are still useful to show a wider selection of land use and farming operations than a single farm would be able to show in a single visit.

If you school is in a town then even though it maybe some distance to the nearest field, the video will enable you to illustrate the main land use in the UK, even if this is not the case in your immediate local area. Or again the videos could serve as a follow up to a farm visit.

Teachers Guide / Ideas.

Videos are available for the lessons dealing with the following questions as given in the QCA Primary Scheme of Work Geography Unit 1 - Around our school - the local area.

 

 

 

National Curriculum Reference

Teachers Note:

This lesson looks at changes in your local area - while strictly speaking this may mean geographical changes the learners involved here are still in the process of observing and appreciating changes in their local environment so the seasonal changes which occur in the countryside around them could provide a suitable and more accessible illustration.

Whilst it is obviously not possible to provide video of your actual local area what we have tried to do is show some typical seasonal changes which occur in the countryside. The video first looks at changes which pupils will be familiar with i.e. seasonal changes of nature, it then shows some typical changes which can occur in the farming countryside over a year and also more long term. The aim is for you to use this as a stimulus for your own discussion of changes which could and have occurred in your own particular area.

Knowledge, skills and understanding:

Source: QCA Statutory content

Teaching should ensure that geographical enquiry and skills are used when developing knowledge and understanding of places, patterns and processes, and environmental change and sustainable development.

Geographical enquiry and skills.

In undertaking geographical enquiry, pupils should be taught to:

  • Ask geographical questions [for example, ‘What is it like to live in this place?’]

  • Observe and record [for example, identify buildings in the street and complete a chart]

  • Express their own views about people, places and environments [for example, about litter in the school]

  • Communicate in different ways [for example, in pictures, speech, writing].

In developing geographical skills, pupils should be taught:

  • Use geographical vocabulary [for example, hill, river, motorway, near, far, north, south]

  • Use fieldwork skills [for example, recording information on a school plan or local area map]

  • Use globes, maps and plans at a range of scales [for example, following a route on a map]

  • Use secondary sources of information [for example, CD-ROMs, pictures, photographs, stories, information texts, videos, artifacts]

  • Make maps and plans [for example, a pictorial map of a place in a story].

Pupils should be taught:

Knowledge and understanding of places.

  • Identify and describe what places are like [for example, in terms of landscape, jobs, weather]

  • Identify and describe where places are [for example, position on a map,whether they are on a river]

  • Recognise how places have become the way they are and how they are changing [for example, the quality of the environment in a street]

  • Recognise how places compare with other places [for example, compare the local area with places elsewhere in the United Kingdom]

  • Recognise how places are linked to other places in the world [for example, food from other countries].

Knowledge and understanding of patterns and processes.

  • Make observations about where things are located [for example, a pedestrian crossing near school gates] and about other features in the environment [for example, seasonal changes in weather]

  • Recognise changes in physical and human features [for example, heavy rain flooding fields].

Knowledge and understanding of environmental change and sustainable development.

  • Recognise changes in the environment [for example, traffic pollution in a street]

  • Recognise how the environment may be improved and sustained for example, by restricting the number of cars].

KS 1 Breadth of Study

Source: QCA Website

During the key stage, pupils should be taught the Knowledge, skills and understanding through the study of two localities:

  • The locality of the school.

  • A locality either in the United Kingdom or overseas that has physical and/or human features that contrast with those in the locality of the school.


In their study of localities, pupils should:

  • Study at a local scale.

  • Carry out fieldwork investigations outside the classroom.

 

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