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We aim to provide a high-quality geography education which inspires pupil’s curiosity and fascination about the world and its people that will remain with them for the rest of their lives. We aim to equip pupils with knowledge about diverse places, people, resources and natural and human environments, together with a deep understanding of the Earth’s key physical and human processes. As pupils progress, their growing knowledge about the world will help them to deepen their understanding of the interaction between physical and human processes, and of the formation and use of landscapes and environments. Geographical knowledge, understanding and skills provide the framework and approaches that explain how the Earth’s features at different scales are shaped, interconnected and change over time.
Term 1 (Autumn term)
In year 7 students are introduced to the subject of geography and the different strands within it. Students being to develop their knowledge of the world and the sense of enquiry using map and atlas work. Students complete a geographical enquiry on issues within the local area before starting to learn more about Liverpool, the city region and NW England and the geographical features and challenges facing the locality and the diversity within our local area. Students visit the waterfront area of Liverpool during this term with the visit including trips to the museums and Pier Head and Albert Dock.
Term 2 (Spring term)
In the Spring term students begin to develop their knowledge of more global places and the processes and challenges occurring within our planet. Students learn more about the location of places such as Iceland, Australia, Maldives and Madagascar and begin to develop their knowledge of tectonics, biomes, coastal areas, river systems, glaciers, HICs v LICs, globalization, resources and people and the planet. Following this, students begin to learn about the more extreme environments within our planet such as polar and desert regions and the location of them, the characteristics and climate, the flora and fauna and the opportunities and challenges these places present. Students then begin to learn about the management of fragile environments and how human impact our planet.
Term 3 (Summer term)
In term 3 students learn about the coastal zone and the processes occurring within it. Students learn about waves and tides, weathering and mass movement, erosional, depositional and transportation processes and landforms and the different management strategies adopted at the coastline. Students complete fieldwork based around the coastal zone at the Sefton coastline. Students then write up their fieldwork focusing on the aims, hypotheses, methods, risk assessment, data analysis, conclusions and evaluation.
Term 1 (Autumn term)
In year 7 students begin by studying population. They investigate how population has changed over time, where people live across our planet and which areas are densely and sparsely populated, the China One Child policy and migration and population challenges. Students then finish the term by studying Africa as a continent, the great variation in biomes within it, the regions of Africa, different cultures and communities across the continent and the misconceptions people have of Africa. Finally, students study the issues around slums and the future of the continent as we progress through the 21st century.
Term 2 (Spring term)
In the Spring term of year 8 students study the physical geography of rivers and glaciers and the connections between them. They study the river system and its long and cross profile, the erosional, transportation and depositional processes and landforms and how these ever-changing systems need human management. Students then study the developing world and the uneven development that is a challenge in some areas of our planet. The concept of HICS, LICS and NEES is investigated looking at places around the globe and the similarities and differences between contrasting places on our planet.
Term 3 (Summer term)
During the Summer term of year 8 students learn about the concept of globalisation through the sport and fashion industry. Students learn about the geographical features of the global sport industry, the organizations involved and the impact on communities when large events such as the Olympic Games and World Cup take place. The legacy of events is investigated in terms of the environmental, social and economic impact on people and places. When studying the fashion industry TNC operations are explored alongside the geographical impact across the planet depending on where operations and manufacturing takes place.
Term 1 (Autumn term)
In the Autumn term students are introduced to hazardous events and the theory of plate tectonics and continental drift. Students learn about the processes occurring at different plate boundaries and the cause, effect and impact of volcanoes, earthquakes and tsunamis. Students analyse different case studies and how hazardous events can be mitigated and responded too. In the second half of the term students learn about biomes, the structure, importance and people of the rainforest and the opportunities and challenges that occur is these areas.
Term 2 (Spring term)
The disease unit links development and disease and the cause, effect and response to both communicable and non-communicable diseases. We investigate contrasting diseases and how they impact areas of contrasting development before studying our planets resources and such as gold, coffee, chocolate and the challenges surrounding food, energy and water. These resources provide lots of opportunities and challenges and we investigate the differences around the world.
Term 3 (Summer term)
To conclude key stage 3, we investigate some of the challenges the planet faces and how in some cases the outlook is more positive than some people think. We look at some of the challenges we face and what is being done to tackle them whilst focusing on fair trade, tourism, NGOs, charities and the geographical futures that may emerge. This is tied together by some of the behaviour we can adopt to support a bright future for the planet, its communities and people.
Students follow the AQA specification for Geography at Key Stage 4. When studying Geography in year 10 and 11 students will cover the following topics:
Key stage 4
Year 10 – Hazards (Autumn term), Resource management & Living World (Spring term), Urban (Summer term)
Year 11 - Coasts & Rivers (Autumn term), Changing Economic World (Spring term), Geographical
The Challenge of Natural Hazards: This part of the specification focuses on what are natural hazards, the physical processes occurring at plate boundaries, effects and responses to earthquakes and living with the risk and attempting to reduce it. This section also includes content on weather hazards and more specifically tropical storms and flooding. We finally move onto climate change, the evidence for it, what causes and what we can do to manage it.
The Living World: In this part of the specification we study ecosystems with a focus on global ecosystems before we go into greater detail in relation to tropical rainforests. When studying tropical rainforests we look into the characteristics of them, deforestation and sustainable management of the rainforest. Our optional section of this unit is hot deserts. This covers the characteristics of deserts, the opportunities and challenges of them and the issue of desertification.
Physical Landscapes in the UK: In the final part of paper 1 we study the UK’s relief and landscapes. We do this through coasts and rivers landscapes. In each of these units we focus on the processes occurring in each of the environments, the landforms resulting from erosion, transportation and deposition and then the management of these environments.
Urban Issues and Challenges: In the first part of paper 2 we study the urban world, the emergence of megacities and the social and economic challenges facing developing cities in the world. We then move onto urban change within the UK and how these environments create both opportunities and challenges and issues such as social inequality, housing, waste, regeneration and sustainability.
The Changing Economic World: In this area we focus on the development gap, population and uneven development on our planet. This links to wealth and health, migration aid, debt relief and tourism. We then move onto newly emerging economies, transnational corporations and environmental issues. This section finishes with a look into the UK economy, science and technology, transport and the UK in the wider world.
The Challenge of Resource Management: The final part of paper 2 is the issues of resource management including food, water and energy. We choose to opt for a greater study of food which focuses on its supply, food insecurity and sustainable food production.
The third paper in GCSE Geography includes questions on an issue evaluation and fieldwork as well as skills based questions. In this section students receive a pre-release booklet 12 weeks before the exam which they study and investigate before being examined on it during the Summer exam series. Students are taught to identify, understand and appreciate the interrelationship between the different aspects of geography. This is tested through a critical thinking and problem solving based task on a current issue. Furthermore students are tested on two fieldwork trips completed during their course with one being a physical and one being a human study. Geographical skills e.g. cartographic, numerical, statistical and data skills are tested on this paper as well as papers 1 and 2.
Key stage 5
Year 12 – Coasts & Population and the environment (Autumn term), Hazards & Changing Places (Spring/Summer term), Preparation for NEA (Summer term)
Year 13 – Water and carbon cycles, Population and the environment (Autumn term) Continuation of NEA, Global governance, (Spring term)
Water and carbon cycles
During this unit students learn about the concept of a natural system and the water and carbon cycles as natural systems. We then move onto looking at the distribution of the major stores of water and carbon and the factors that drive change in these systems. The unit then finishes by looking at the impact of the carbon cycle on the atmosphere, ocean and land.
Coastal systems and landscapes
Within the coastal unit students learn about how coastal systems operate to create a unique and dynamic environment with key processes operating at the shore and the sea. These processes then create unique landforms at the coast. Students develop an understanding of how coasts change over time and the reasons for this.
Hazards
Within this topic students learn about the nature, form and potential impacts of hazards and how people’s perception of hazards and cultural determinants vary across the globe. Students then learn more about the theory of plate tectonics and the nature and causes of vulcanicity, seismicity, the cause effect and response to tropical storms, wildfires and before studying these in greater depth through case studies.
Global systems and global governance
Within this contemporary scheme of work, students learning about the phenomenon of globalisation, the factors that influence it, how global systems operate and the patterns and factors influencing global trade. Students delve deeper into a transnational corporation before looking at Antarctica and the global commons.
Changing places
Students learns about how geographers define the term, place and how places are represented in a variety of ways. Further analysis of how these representations are constructed and shaped by a variety of internal and external forces over a period time provides a sense of enquiry whilst qualitative and quantitative techniques are used to investigate the character of a local place in comparison to one further away.
Population and the environment
The nature of global population and how it is influenced by climate, soil, topography and resources provides a platform to understand the global patterns of food security and consumption and how major climate zones are distributed around our planet. Global patterns of health mortality and morbidity are analysed before population indicators and the concept of overpopulation, underpopulation and optimum population are analysed. Finally contrasting perspectives on population growth and predications of change over time provide an enquiry line.
Fieldwork and geographical skills
During the course students plan and carry out their own geographical fieldwork investigation. This includes research, risk assessment, methodology, data collection, analysis, conclusion and evaluation. Students develop a wide range of geographical skills when completing this. e.g. cartographic, statistical and graphical.
Exam Board: AQA (GCSE) AQA (A-Level)
Useful Links
BBC Bitesize Geography: https://www.bbc.com/bitesize/subjects/zkw76sg
BBC News: Science and the environment:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science_and_environment
S-Cool Geography: https://www.s-cool.co.uk/gcse/geography
Bay of Naples trip: Key Stage 4
Revision sessions weekly for key stage 4 & 5 students
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